Masculinity, Health, and the Power of Understanding:
Why Dr. Smiler’s Books Make an Impact on the Conversation
If you care about men and boys, you already know this truth:
Conversations about masculinity are everywhere, but clarity is not.
Men are often told what is wrong, without being given the language, context, or tools to understand why certain expectations exist or how they affect health, relationships, and daily life. For families, educators, clinicians, and advocates working in men’s health, this gap shows up constantly, in delayed care, unspoken stress, strained relationships, and missed opportunities for prevention.
That’s where the work of Dr. Andrew Smiler, a prominent psychologist and author, stands out.
Rather than fueling culture-war debates, Smiler focuses on something far more useful:
Helping people understand how masculinity is learned, reinforced, and lived, and how it can evolve in ways that support healthier outcomes for men, boys, and the people who care about them.
Dr. Smiler’s writing meets readers where they are, whether they are new to these conversations or deeply engaged in men’s health, education, or research.
Together, Is Masculinity Toxic?: A Primer for the 21st Century and The Masculine Self (7th Edition) offer a rare and powerful pairing. One provides a clear, accessible entry point for navigating today’s most charged questions around masculinity. The other delivers the research-informed depth needed to understand how masculine norms influence mental health, physical health, relationships, and help-seeking across the lifespan. Read together, these books move readers beyond sound bites and stereotypes, toward practical language, evidence-based insight, and a more empathetic, effective way of supporting men and boys in real life.
Book 1: “Is Masculinity Toxic?” (A modern, readable primer)
The question “Is masculinity toxic?” shows up everywhere, on social media, in classrooms, in the workplace, and in everyday conversations. But the way it gets discussed often creates more heat than light. Is Masculinity Toxic?: A Primer for the 21st Century meets that moment with clarity and balance, taking a complicated debate and turning it into a guided conversation that readers can actually use.
Published as part of Thames & Hudson’s The Big Idea series, this book is designed to be short, approachable, and thought-provoking. It explores how masculinity has been defined over time, why certain expectations persist, and how those expectations can shape everything from emotional expression to relationships to health behaviors.
What makes this book especially valuable is that it avoids the trap of turning masculinity into a punchline or a label. Instead, it invites readers to consider the real question underneath the headline: Which messages about masculinity help men and communities thrive, and which ones lead to harm, isolation, or preventable risk?
This is a great pick for:
- Readers who want an entry point into modern masculinity discussions
- Book clubs, classrooms, and community conversations
- Anyone who wants to move from “hot takes” to informed reflection
Book 2: “The Masculine Self” (7th Edition) (A deeper, research-informed foundation)
If Is Masculinity Toxic? is the primer, The Masculine Self (7th Edition) is the foundation.
Co-authored by Andrew Smiler and Christopher Kilmartin, this book applies mainstream psychological theory to gendered perspectives on men and boys, then expands into an evidence-informed look at key “men’s issues” that show up across the lifespan, including emotion, aggression, relationships, mental health, physical health, and more. (Sloan Publishing)
This is the kind of text that helps readers connect the dots between:
- Social expectations and identity development
- Mental health, coping, and help-seeking behavior
- Health behaviors and risk-taking patterns
- Relationships, communication, and caregiving roles
- How systems (schools, workplaces, healthcare) engage men and boys
It’s also simply a strong tool for people who want to teach, lead discussions, or design programs that involve men and boys. If your work touches education, public health, counseling, community outreach, or advocacy, this book gives you both language and structure to do that work more effectively. (Amazon)
Why these two books work so well together
People often approach masculinity from one of two directions:
- Cultural conversation (what’s happening in the news and daily life)
- Research and theory (what the evidence says, how patterns form, how change happens)
Smiler’s books cover both lanes.
- Is Masculinity Toxic? helps you enter the conversation clearly and responsibly, without oversimplifying it. (Thames & Hudson)
- The Masculine Self helps you understand the underlying psychological and social dynamics so your takeaways aren’t just opinions, they’re grounded in what we know about development, behavior, and health. (Sloan Publishing)
If you’re building programs, teaching students, training staff, leading community conversations, or even just trying to understand the men in your life better, reading them together offers both immediacy and depth.
Who should read these (and how to use them)
If you’re an educator or professor:
Use Is Masculinity Toxic? as a short, accessible entry point for discussion, then bring in The Masculine Self as your primary text for deeper learning and applied frameworks.
If you’re a community leader or organizer:
Start with Is Masculinity Toxic? for shared language, then use The Masculine Self to shape programming that actually reflects how men engage (or disengage) with health, emotion, and support systems.
If you’re a clinician, coach, or counselor:
The primer helps with cultural context and client-facing language, while the textbook supports more structured insight into patterns you see across different masculinity norms and life stages. (Amazon)
If you’re a curious reader:
Begin with Is Masculinity Toxic? and treat it like a lens. If you find yourself underlining passages and thinking “Wait, I want to understand this more,” that’s exactly when The Masculine Self becomes your next step.
Buy online (Amazon links):
Is Masculinity Toxic?: A Primer for the 21st Century (The Big Idea Series)
The Masculine Self, Seventh Edition
About Dr. Andrew Smiler:
Dr. Andrew Smiler is a psychologist, author, and nationally recognized expert on men, masculinity, and gender socialization. His work focuses on how cultural expectations around masculinity shape identity, relationships, mental health, and health behaviors across the lifespan.
He is the author of Is Masculinity Toxic?: A Primer for the 21st Century and the lead author of The Masculine Self (7th Edition), a widely used textbook in psychology and men’s studies courses. Across both academic and public-facing writing, Dr. Smiler is known for translating research into clear, practical insights that support healthier conversations and outcomes for men and the people who care about them.
Dr. Smiler serves as an Advisory Board Member for Men’s Health Network, contributing his expertise to empathy-driven, community-focused men’s health education, advocacy, and awareness efforts.
