Studying Sexualities

Sexuality is an integral part of our lives, and our identities. But how do we study it? Written in a lively and accessible style, Studying Sexualities aims to introduce students to the critical study of sexuality, taking a look at the major theories, media representations, and cultural practices. After having carefully explained the key theoretical and empirical debates on the subject – outlining Foucauldian Constructionism, Psychoanalysis, and Queer Theory - the authors draw on their own original research to address timely topics related to gender, sexuality, and popular culture. Contemporary examples used within the book include discussions of sex shops, cybersex, and sex toys, the TV series Sex and the City, Will and Grace and The L Word, and the immensely popular Twilight books. Studying Sexualities is essential reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students on Cultural, Media, Film, or visual Studies, or Sociology and Sexuality courses, who are interested in researching the fascinating complexities of sexuality today. NIALL RICHARDSON is a lecturer at the University of Sussex, and CLARISSA SMITH and ANGELA WERNDLY are lecturers at the University of Sunderland, UK. This book is the culmination of their considerable teaching and writing experience within the field of sexualities. Their specific research interests include feminism and popular culture, queer theory, the body and consumption.

Introducing the New Sexuality Studies: Original Essays is an innovative, reader-friendly collection of essays that introduces the field of sexuality studies to undergraduate students. Examining the social, cultural, and historical dimensions of sexuality, this collection is designed to serve as a comprehensive yet accessible textbook for sexuality courses at the undergraduate level. The fourth edition adds 51 new essays whilst retaining 33 of the most popular essays from previous editions. It features perspectives that are intersectional, transnational, sex positive, and attentive to historically marginalized groups along multiple axes of inequality, including gender, race, class, ability, body size, religious identity, age, and, of course, sexuality. Essays explore how a wide variety of social institutions, including medicine, religion, the state, and education, shape sexual desires, behaviors, and identities. Sources of, and empirical research on, oppression are discussed, along with modes of resistance, activism, and policy change. The fourth edition also adds new user-friendly features for students and instructors. Keywords are italicized and defined, and each chapter concludes with review questions to help students ascertain their comprehension of key points. There is also an online annotated table of contents to help readers identify key ideas and concepts at a glance for each chapter.

Breaking new ground, both substantively and stylistically, this book offers students, academics and researchers an accessible, engaging introduction and overview of the emerging field of sexuality studies.

Introduction -- Kissing cousins : queerness, crime, and knowing -- Seeing sexuality like a state -- Forensic psychology, complicit expertise, and the legitimation of law -- Insurgent expertise and the hybrid network of LGBTQ asylum -- Asylum seekers and signs of queerness -- Sex offenders and the detection of deviance -- Queer subjects and the construction of risky countries -- Sexual predators and the constitution of dangerous individuals -- Conclusion : sexuality, science, and citizenship in the twenty-first century.

An inclusive and accessible resource on the interdisciplinary study of gender and sexuality Companion to Sexuality Studies explores the significant theories, concepts, themes, events, and debates of the interdisciplinary study of sexuality in a broad range of cultural, social, and political contexts. Bringing together essays by an international team of experts from diverse academic backgrounds, this comprehensive volume provides original insights and fresh perspectives on the history and institutional regulatory processes that socially construct sex and sexuality and examines the movements for social justice that advance sexual citizenship and reproductive rights. Detailed yet accessible chapters explore the intersection of sexuality studies and fields such as science, health, psychology, economics, environmental studies, and social movements over different periods of time and in different social and national contexts. Divided into five parts, the Companion first discusses the theoretical and methodological diversity of sexuality studies.Subsequent chapters address the fields of health, science and psychology, religion, education and the economy. They also include attention to sexuality as constructed in popular culture, as well as global activism, sexual citizenship, policy, and law. An essential overview and an important addition to scholarship in the field, this book: Draws on international, postcolonial, intersectional, and interdisciplinary insights from scholars working on sexuality studies around the world Provides a comprehensive overview of the field of sexuality studies Offers a diverse range of topics, themes, and perspectives from leading authorities Focuses on the study of sexuality from the late nineteenth century to the present Includes an overview of the history and academic institutionalization of sexuality studies The Companion to Sexuality Studies is an indispensable resource for scholars, researchers, instructors, and students in gender, sexuality, and feminist studies, interdisciplinary programs in cultural studies, international studies, and human rights, as well as disciplines such as anthropology, psychology, history, education, human geography, political science, and sociology.

An inclusive and accessible resource on the interdisciplinary study of gender and sexuality Companion to Sexuality Studies explores the significant theories, concepts, themes, events, and debates of the interdisciplinary study of sexuality in a broad range of cultural, social, and political contexts. Bringing together essays by an international team of experts from diverse academic backgrounds, this comprehensive volume provides original insights and fresh perspectives on the history and institutional regulatory processes that socially construct sex and sexuality and examines the movements for social justice that advance sexual citizenship and reproductive rights. Detailed yet accessible chapters explore the intersection of sexuality studies and fields such as science, health, psychology, economics, environmental studies, and social movements over different periods of time and in different social and national contexts. Divided into five parts, the Companion first discusses the theoretical and methodological diversity of sexuality studies.Subsequent chapters address the fields of health, science and psychology, religion, education and the economy. They also include attention to sexuality as constructed in popular culture, as well as global activism, sexual citizenship, policy, and law. An essential overview and an important addition to scholarship in the field, this book: Draws on international, postcolonial, intersectional, and interdisciplinary insights from scholars working on sexuality studies around the world Provides a comprehensive overview of the field of sexuality studies Offers a diverse range of topics, themes, and perspectives from leading authorities Focuses on the study of sexuality from the late nineteenth century to the present Includes an overview of the history and academic institutionalization of sexuality studies The Companion to Sexuality Studies is an indispensable resource for scholars, researchers, instructors, and students in gender, sexuality, and feminist studies, interdisciplinary programs in cultural studies, international studies, and human rights, as well as disciplines such as anthropology, psychology, history, education, human geography, political science, and sociology.

This collection brings together cutting-edge work by established and emerging scholars focusing on key societies in the East Asian region: China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, North and South Korea, Mongolia and Vietnam. This scope enables the collection to reflect on the nature of the transformations in constructions of sexuality in highly developed, developing and emerging societies and economies. Both Japan and China have established traditions of ‘sexuality’ studies reflecting longstanding indigenous understandings of sex as well as more recent developments which interface with Euro-American medical and psychological understandings. Authors reflect upon the complex colonial and economic interactions and cultural flows which have affected the East Asian region over the last two centuries. They trace local flows of ideas instead of defaulting to Euro-American paradigms for sexuality studies. Through looking at regional and global exchanges of ideas about sexuality, this volume adds considerably to our understanding of the East Asian region and contributes to wider discussions of social transformation, modernisation and globalisation. It will be essential reading in undergraduate and graduate programs in sexuality studies, gender studies, women’s studies and masculinity studies, as well as in anthropology, sociology, history, cultural studies, area studies and health sciences.

As the field of sexuality studies has become a growth area in academia and classes on sexuality studies are incorporated into various disciplines, the expanding book market has been filled with specialist oriented texts which are often theoretically focused and contain too many summaries for an undergraduate audience. Addressing this imbalance, this key new volume presents the field of sexuality in an accessible and engaging way for undergraduates. Breaking new ground, both substantively and stylistically, this book offers students, academics and researchers an accessible, engaging introduction and overview of this emerging field. Its central premise is to explore the social character of sexuality, the role of social differences such as race or nationality in creating sexual variation, and the ways sex is entangled in relations of power and inequality. Through this novel approach, the field of sexuality is considered, for the first time, in multicultural, global, and comparative terms and from a truly social perspective. This important volume consists of over fifty short and original essays on the key topics and themes in sexuality studies, and interviews with twelve leading scholars in the field which convey some of the most innovative work being done. Each contribution clearly conveys the latest research with examples. Ideal for students of gender and sexuality studies, this topical and timely volume will be an invaluable resource to all those with an interest in sexuality studies.