Culture, Alcohol, and the Significance of Punishment in Constructing White Masculinity

• In Event: 296 - Section on Alcohol, Drugs and Tobacco Roundtables (one-hour). Table 01. Networks and Substance Use
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 03. Substance Use and Interventions

Abstract

An Aggie does not lie, cheat or steal nor tolerate those who do. For many years, Texas A&M University has imposed this code of ethics upon its academic community. Although aimed at academic violations, the Aggie Code of Honor has permeated into other interests of campus life. Campus life involves simply more than just scholarly integration and encourages students to develop relationships with their peers, other Aggies. Considering many young college students discover newfound autonomy from their parents or guardians, some students realize that their decisions may infringe upon student regulations. Attendance at a university is not mandatory nevertheless each member of the academic community is obligated to conduct himself or herself within the institution’s code of conduct. When a student actively defies student regulation, a complex series of procedures move forward in order to yield the proper punishment. These series of actions proceed from a complex understanding of the punishment of culture. In this paper, I propose to examine how punishment shapes the understanding of white masculinity. Specifically, I will center my analysis on a dataset constructed by Texas A&M University’s Student Conduct Office that provides insight to the common student code violations and sanctions from 2009-2014. While incorporating the culture of punishment into my argument, I hypothesize that Texas A&M University’s enactment of punishment focuses on correcting underage white males while still combatting illegal consumption of alcohol and drugs of college students.

Authors

• Beatriz Aldana Marquez, Texas A&M University

• Emily Knox, Texas A&M University