The concept of subjectivity is wider and more encompassing than a study of gender or regional subjectivity can reveal. Although Chapter Three examined some wider aspects of subjectivity in relation to regional belonging, such as class consciousness, industrial militancy and sectarianism, more extensive research into aspects of subjectivity other than gender is of key importance in ascertaining the extent to which the subjectivities of men working in reserved occupations were influenced by wartime discourses of social change. While men in reserved occupations subscribed to a range of highly significant ‘imagined’ subjectivities, particularly in the public sphere, this chapter will argue that ‘lived’ and more private facets of life were also integral to the subjectivities of these men and were thus key factors in shaping their masculinities during and beyond wartime. The chapter therefore also argues that the continuity of masculinity inevitably superseded the changes wrought by the Second World War.

Historical arguments about gender identities have often centred upon artificial separations between women and men. Higonnet and Higonnet's metaphor of the ‘double helix’ describes men's and women's lives as separate ‘strands’, arguing that although male and female roles have varied in different historical contexts, including war, the relationship between men and women in society has remained constant, with the status of women always subordinate to that of men. Joan Scott notably argued that discussion of gendered divisions arose from the emergence of ‘new history’ accounting for the experiences of women and other oppressed social groups and often informed by theories of social and cultural history and feminism. Such history has frequently neglected the experiences of men, and Scott's difficulties with historical approaches taken by female researchers centre upon the reification of antagonism between men and women and the need to conceive of gender as constructed of inter-connected processes. Although Higonnet and Higonnet's metaphor of the ‘double helix’ calls for the study of men and women in relation to one another, their work pre-defines these relations and does not allow for the level of inter-connection imagined by Scott. The collection of articles in Higonnet and Higonnet's edited collection Behind the Lines centres upon the subjectivities of women and conflict between men and women, rather than fully exploring the fluctuating relationships between them.