Uses Of The Erotic

Pornography: The force for change that has been written out of the history of world culture. From cave painting to photography to the internet, pornography has always been at the cutting edge in adopting and exploiting new developments in mass communication. And in so doing, it has helped to promote and propel those developments in ways that are rarely acknowledged. Without pornography, the internet would not have grown so quickly. The e-commerce payment systems that are now commonplace would be at a far more primitive stage security and usability. Without video streaming software developed for pornography sites, CNN would be struggling to deliver news clips. Without advertising from sex sites, Google could not have afforded YouTube. This smart, witty and well-researched history shows how a vast secret trade has bankrolled and shaped mainstream culture and its machines.

Excerpts from foundational work, recent journal articles and pieces written for this text about the role of communication in the construction and performance of sexualities in interpersonal contexts and public discourses.

Making Sense of Women's Lives presents a wide range of writings about women's lives in the United States. Michele Plott and Lauri Umansky have drawn on their experiences as both students and professors to assemble the collection. Seeking to provide as full a sampling from a diverse and intellectually vibrant field as one volume permits, the editors have also chosen writing that makes an enjoyable read. A few of the selections here represent the undisputed 'classics' of the field. More of them constitute simply the works, drawn from academic and nonacademic sources alike, that could make a difference in understanding what it means to be female in America. Making Sense of Women's Lives is intended as the primary text in Women's Studies courses. With that usage in mind, Plott and Umansky have provided brief introductions to each article to help students understand the author's perspectives. Thought and discussion questions follow each selection. The book contains, as well, numerous "Flash Exercises" suggestions for class exercises and activities. The editors have used these activities in their courses over the past decade, in conjunction with readings in this volume, and have found that the full complement of materials coalesces into an intellectually powerful introduction to Women's Studies. A Collegiate Press book

Presenting the essential writings of black lesbian poet and feminist writer Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider celebrates an influential voice in twentieth-century literature. “[Lorde's] works will be important to those truly interested in growing up sensitive, intelligent, and aware.”—The New York Times In this charged collection of fifteen essays and speeches, Lorde takes on sexism, racism, ageism, homophobia, and class, and propounds social difference as a vehicle for action and change. Her prose is incisive, unflinching, and lyrical, reflecting struggle but ultimately offering messages of hope. This commemorative edition includes a new foreword by Lorde-scholar and poet Cheryl Clarke, who celebrates the ways in which Lorde's philosophies resonate more than twenty years after they were first published. These landmark writings are, in Lorde's own words, a call to “never close our eyes to the terror, to the chaos which is Black which is creative which is female which is dark which is rejected which is messy which is . . . ”