This collection includes twelve contributions from authors all over the world and an introduction by the editors, Paul Baker & Giuseppe Balirano, in order to provide some insight into both new and old media on masculinity and queer studies. The editors' intention was to analyse the existence of or resistance to nonhegemonic masculinities, and thus it gives the reader a political stance from which to contrast accepted heteronormative behaviour with other gender identities, whether they are complementary or not. In order to do this, several authors explore various aspects of masculinity through queer studies, linguistics, semiotics, anthropology, literature, film, and critical studies.

The authors of the different essays show how both visual and written texts can disrupt and mystify traditional notions on how a man should behave, talk, and interact with each other. Some chapters that deal with the visual representation of men leave the window of possibility open for the heteronormative audience to relate to them, too, as can be seen in chapters by Tommaso M. Milani (chapter 2), Eleonora Federeci & Andrea Bernardelli (chapter 3), and Vincenzo Bavaro (chapter 4). It is not only TV shows but also commercials that are advertised to all men (creating what is described as ‘collaborative masculinity’). However, some other chapters that deal with visual representation—for example, chapter 5 by Laura Tommaso and chapter 10 by Emilio Amideo—do so while paying attention to stigmatised minorities whom these authors consider invisible nowadays in terms of public discourse in media, even in their own community—old gay men and black men. These writers raise some questions on speech patterns and stereotypes in the portrayal of these characters that not only try to make the audience relate to a show or film but try to awaken the spectator to a more fluid culture in opposition to a selected representation that can be found in commercials, for example.

This collection also shows different and new forms of gender hybridisation by including complex instances of the male political body in society and its representation in media. There is not only the question of the black man, black queer desire, and the dichotomy of the good and the bad ‘negro’ in Amideo's essay, but also the complex situation of immigrants in the EU that apply for asylum in terms of sexuality, especially in the UK, in the chapter by Maria Cristina Nisco.

This analysis of masculinity from different stances is mostly political and social as it is the performance of one's masculinity that creates at the same time multiple masculine identities. Hence, most of the authors agree that men are able to position themselves on a different side of the spectrum when needed (especially Federici & Bernardelli, Bavaro, Paola Di Gennaro, Andrew Brindle, and Emilia Di Martino), thus opening different and wide possibilities for future researchers on the different social genders and their representation in society as well as the entitlement to power some may feel.