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Author: Jeffrey Weeks
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134949308
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 342
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Book Description
Few topics evoke so much anxiety and pleasure, pain and hope, discussion and silence as sexuality. Throughout the Christian era it has been a major moral preoccupation. Since the eighteenth century it has also been the focus of 'scientific' exploration and political activity. But, despite this obsessive concern, we are still as baffled as our predecessors about the 'true' meaning of sex. In this book Jeffrey Weeks unravels the dense web of historical, theoretical and political forces that have culminated in the contemporary crisis of sexual meanings and values. The book begins with a powerful evocation of our present discontents and their potent signs: the rise of the New Right, the retreat of progressive forces and a wave of moral panics around sex. It argues that this crisis is rooted in a tradition which has ascribed an inflated importance to sexuality, whilst claiming a privileged access to truth. The author then examines radical debates of recent years, and asks whether they contain the potentiality for taking us beyond the existing boundaries of sexuality. From this analysis emerges a controversial 'radical pluralist' approach to sexuality built on an acceptance of diversity and choice. By linking our present discontents to a clear understanding of the past, Jeffrey Weeks presents a rational, optimistic and challenging vision of a realizable future.
Author: Jeffrey Weeks
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134949308
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 342
Get Book Here
Book Description
Few topics evoke so much anxiety and pleasure, pain and hope, discussion and silence as sexuality. Throughout the Christian era it has been a major moral preoccupation. Since the eighteenth century it has also been the focus of 'scientific' exploration and political activity. But, despite this obsessive concern, we are still as baffled as our predecessors about the 'true' meaning of sex. In this book Jeffrey Weeks unravels the dense web of historical, theoretical and political forces that have culminated in the contemporary crisis of sexual meanings and values. The book begins with a powerful evocation of our present discontents and their potent signs: the rise of the New Right, the retreat of progressive forces and a wave of moral panics around sex. It argues that this crisis is rooted in a tradition which has ascribed an inflated importance to sexuality, whilst claiming a privileged access to truth. The author then examines radical debates of recent years, and asks whether they contain the potentiality for taking us beyond the existing boundaries of sexuality. From this analysis emerges a controversial 'radical pluralist' approach to sexuality built on an acceptance of diversity and choice. By linking our present discontents to a clear understanding of the past, Jeffrey Weeks presents a rational, optimistic and challenging vision of a realizable future.
Author: Jeffrey Weeks
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134457340
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 175
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Book Description
We are almost programmed into thinking of our sexuality as a wholly natural feature of life. But sexual relations are but one form of social relations, as Jeffrey Weeks makes clear in his book. Drawing on the analyses of Michel Foucault, amongst others, the book examines the social, moral and political issues raised by contemporary forms of sexuality. Weeks provides an authoritative introduction to the sociology of sexuality, discussing its cultural and socio-historical construction, it's relationship with power and the State's involvement in its rationalisation and regulation. This second edition is also updates to include global and postcolonial perspectives on sexuality, queer theory, the internet and cybersex, AIDS as a global phenomenon and international debates on the politics of sexuality. This book is an indispensable introduction to this complex and expanding field.
Author: Mari Jo BUHLE
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674029070
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 442
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Book Description
With Sigmund Freud notoriously flummoxed about what women want, any encounter between psychoanalysis and feminism would seem to promise a standoff. But in this lively, often surprising history, Mari Jo Buhle reveals that the twentieth century's two great theories of liberation actually had a great deal to tell each other. Starting with Freud's 1909 speech to an audience that included the feminist and radical Emma Goldman, Buhle recounts all the twists and turns this exchange took in the United States up to the recent American vogue of Jacques Lacan. While chronicling the contributions of feminism to the development of psychoanalysis, she also makes an intriguing case for the benefits psychoanalysis brought to feminism. From the first, American psychoanalysis became the property of freewheeling intellectuals and popularists as well as trained analysts. Thus the cultural terrain that Buhle investigates is populated by literary critics, artists and filmmakers, historians, anthropologists, and sociologists--and the resulting psychoanalysis is not so much a strictly therapeutic theory as an immensely popular form of public discourse. She charts the history of feminism from the first wave in the 1910s to the second in the 1960s and into a variety of recent expressions. Where these paths meet, we see how the ideas of Freud and his followers helped further the real-life goals of a feminism that was a widespread social movement and not just an academic phenomenon. The marriage between psychoanalysis and feminism was not pure bliss, however, and Buhle documents the trying moments; most notably the "Momism" of the 1940s and 1950s, a remarkable instance of men blaming their own failures of virility on women. An ambitious and highly engaging history of ideas, Feminism and Its Discontents brings together far-flung intellectual tendencies rarely seen in intimate relation to each other--and shows us a new way of seeing both. Table of Contents: Introduction Feminism, Freudianism, and Female Subjectivity Dissent in Freud's Ranks Culture and Feminine Personality Momism and the Flight from Manhood Ladies in the Dark Feminists versus Freud Feminine Self-in-Relation The Crisis in Patriarchal Authority In the Age of the Vanishing Subject Notes Acknowledgments Index Reviews of this book: Where some feminists have been hostile to psychoanalysis, and some psychoanalysts have been hostile to feminism, Buhle, a MacArthur Fellow and professor at Brown University, finds them linked in their quest to understand selfhood, gender identity, family structures and sexual expression...Feminism and Its Discontents is an excellent guide to the history of these ideas...The struggles of feminism and psychoanalysis may be cyclical, but they are far from over, and far from dull. --Elaine Showalter, Washington Post Book World Reviews of this book: Buhle's project is to uncover the 'continual conversation' that feminism and psychoanalysis have had with one another, to show how they are mutually constitutive. By charting the exchanges between psychoanalysis and feminism, Feminism and Its Discontents corrects the common impression that feminist criticisms fell on deaf, if not disdainful, ears. Buhle takes pains to detail how feminists and their opponents inside and outside psychoanalysis have set the terms for key debates...Buhle is an animated and engaged storyteller. The story she tells--covering nearly a century of the vicissitudes of psychoanalysis and feminism--is full of twists and turns, well-chosen anecdotes and occasional double-crosses. The cast of characters is inspiring, exasperating, remarkable, mercurial, colorful and sometimes slightly loony. Buhle draws them with sympathy and a keen eye for the evocative detail...Buhle writes with zest, touches of humor and energy. Her style is witty and readable...It is no mean feat to avoid ponderous and technical language when writing about psychoanalysis, but she manages it...All told, psychoanalysis and feminism, sometimes in tandem and sometimes at arm's length, have made vital contributions to the question of female selfhood. The 'odd couple' of our century, they share a large part of the responsibility for our particular form of self-consciousness and for the meaning of individuality in modern society. Mari Jo Buhle deftly illuminates how together they advanced the ambiguous and radical project of modern selfhood. --Jeanne Marecek, Women's Review of Books Reviews of this book: Feminism and Its Discontents sets out to unravel the wondrously complex love-hate relationships between--and within--feminism and psychoanalysis, which it sees as the two most important movements of modernity...The twists and tensions in that relationship highlight the continuous arguments around sexual difference and their entanglement in the messy conflicts in women's lives between motherhood and careers, self-realization and gender justice...Buhle leads her readers through the repeated battles over feminism, Freudianism and female subjectivity with exceptional clarity and care. Her book will...serve as a reliable introduction for those who have scant knowledge of the historical ties binding feminism to psychoanalysis [and] is also useful for those...who wish to remind themselves of what they thought they already knew, but may well have forgotten. --Lynn Segal, Radical Philosophy Reviews of this book: Feminism and Its Discontents adds a novel and welcome twist to [the Freud] conversation, the proposition that feminism was so central to Freud's Americanization that the quest for gender equality can be credited with turning psychoanalysis into what we imagine it always was: an enterprise centered on femininity and female sexuality...[Buhle's] assertions are as enticing as they are controversial...The book [is] as relevant for students of feminist politics as for scholars interested in the history of psychoanalysis itself. --Ellen Herman, Journal of American History Reviews of this book: An exhaustively researched and accessibly written account of the intersections and collisions between [psychoanalysis and feminism]...Buhle chronicles the gyrations of history and assesses how social theory influences culture and vice versa. The result is far-reaching, and she is at her best when reflecting on how the mainstream accommodates and interprets the scholarly. Overall, the text promises a lively overview of the mutual benefits derived from a critical coalition between psychoanaylsis and feminism. Highly recommended for all libraries. --Eleanor J. Bader, Library Journal Reviews of this book: [Buhle] bases her intriguing and expansive historical study on the premise that feminism and psychoanalytic theory, each in its own way concerned with understanding the 'self,' developed in continuous dialogue with each other. The author's captivating, energetic writing style reflects the often spirited, surprisingly tenacious relationship of these two theories--from their emergence as 'unlikely bedpartners of Modernism'; through the shifting intellectual patterns of this century and the insidious mother-blaming of the '50s; to the contemporary postmodern paradigm of subjectivity and selfhood. Combining thorough research and incisive analysis, Buhle examines the ongoing discourse among Freudian, new-Freudian, and feminist theorists throughout the century as well as the endless fascination of popular culture with the questions of biology versus culture, difference versus equality. A vital addition to both women's studies and psychology collections. --Grace Fill, Booklist Reviews of this book: Feminism and Its Discontents covers a dazzling spectrum of thinkers and polemicists, ranging from Charlotte Perkins Gilman to Barbara Ehrenreich, with admirable clarity and succinctness. [Buhle's] reach in terms of American [and French] classical, neo-, and post-Freudian writing by men and women on women's psychosexual development is equally impressive...Few scholars would attempt a comprehensive intellectual history on such a charged topic. Buhle has done so in this informative scholarly feat. --Kirkus Reviews Reviews of this book: Buhle has bridged the void between feminism and psychoanalysis with a historian's thorough and penetrating interpretation of theories and thoughts implicit in 20th-century liberation movements. The introduction is clearly developed and carefully documented...Each [chapter] is skillfully organized with extensive references and notes to motivate the astute scholar...There is no question that Buhle has adeptly used a multidisciplinary approach to present ideas and thoughts that give contemporary feminists and post-Freudians another opportunity for dialogue on the terms 'difference' and 'equality.' --G.M. Greenberg, Choice Feminism and psychoanalysis have each been defining moments of this now fading century, and in their tangled relations lie some of its main preoccupations. It takes a historian's eye to unravel this story, and one with the breadth, sympathy, insight, and wit of Mari Jo Buhle to do it justice. Feminism And Its Discontents will undoubtedly stand as the definitive study of the encounter between these two great movements. --Joel Kovel, Bard College, author of Red Hun
Author: Paola Marion
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000404706
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 173
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Book Description
Through the lens of psychoanalytic thought about sexuality, the book examines changes in the area of procreation and generation, the disjunction between sexuality and procreation introduced by biotechnology and some new methods of reproduction, and their impact on the essential moments of existence (birth, illness, death) and the most intimate aspects of personal identity (sexuality, procreation, body). At the centre of this book is the thesis that the disjunction between sexuality and procreation brought about by biotechnology represents a new scenario and introduces elements of discontinuity. What kind of effects on individuals will the modifications introduced by biotechnologies in the field of procreation have? How can these changes affect even the most profound aspects of personal identity, including body and sexuality? How might they interfere with the sphere of desire? The book investigates the new scenarios and the consequences which are emerging, such as an alteration of personal boundaries, both in spatial and temporal terms, which is reflected in our way of thinking about ourselves and our relationships and the assertion of an unconscious fantasy that the limits imposed by sexuality and death can be surpassed. Offering a psychoanalytic reading of changes introduced in this field, this book will appeal to training and practising psychoanalysts, as well as philosophers, psychologists and gynaecologists.
Author: Sigmund Freud
Publisher: Courier Dover Publications
ISBN: 0486282538
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 81
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Book Description
(Dover thrift editions).
Author: Martin Summers
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN: 080786417X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 399
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Book Description
In a pathbreaking new assessment of the shaping of black male identity in the early twentieth century, Martin Summers explores how middle-class African American and African Caribbean immigrant men constructed a gendered sense of self through organizational life, work, leisure, and cultural production. Examining both the public and private aspects of gender formation, Summers challenges the current trajectory of masculinity studies by treating black men as historical agents in their own identity formation, rather than as screens on which white men projected their own racial and gender anxieties and desires. Manliness and Its Discontents focuses on four distinct yet overlapping social milieus: the fraternal order of Prince Hall Freemasonry; the black nationalist Universal Negro Improvement Association, or the Garvey movement; the modernist circles of the Harlem Renaissance; and the campuses of historically black Howard and Fisk Universities. Between 1900 and 1930, Summers argues, dominant notions of what it meant to be a man within the black middle class changed from a Victorian ideal of manliness--characterized by the importance of producer values, respectability, and patriarchy--to a modern ethos of masculinity, which was shaped more by consumption, physicality, and sexuality. Summers evaluates the relationships between black men and black women as well as relationships among black men themselves, broadening our understanding of the way that gender works along with class, sexuality, and age to shape identities and produce relationships of power.
Author: Myron Magnet
Publisher: Rlpg/Galleys
ISBN:
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 244
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Book Description
Drawn from the City Journal, thses cogent essays add up to the deepest, most informative appraisal we have of how and why the sexual revolution has failed and how we might begin to reconstruct the relations between the sexes in ways that reconcile freedom with humanity.
Author: Nora E. Jaffary
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469629410
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 323
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Book Description
In this history of childbirth and contraception in Mexico, Nora E. Jaffary chronicles colonial and nineteenth-century beliefs and practices surrounding conception, pregnancy and its prevention, and birth. Tracking Mexico's transition from colony to nation, Jaffary demonstrates the central role of reproduction in ideas about female sexuality and virtue, the development of modern Mexico, and the growth of modern medicine in the Latin American context. The story encompasses networks of people in all parts of society, from state and medical authorities to mothers and midwives, husbands and lovers, employers and neighbors. Jaffary focuses on key topics including virginity, conception, contraception and abortion, infanticide, "monstrous" births, and obstetrical medicine. Her approach yields surprising insights into the emergence of modernity in Mexico. Over the course of the nineteenth century, for example, expectations of idealized womanhood and female sexual virtue gained rather than lost importance. In addition, rather than being obliterated by European medical practice, features of pre-Columbian obstetrical knowledge, especially of abortifacients, circulated among the Mexican public throughout the period under study. Jaffary details how, across time, localized contexts shaped the changing history of reproduction, contraception, and maternity.
Author: Neil J. Smelser
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 9780691004372
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 334
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Book Description
This work asks the question: does any social solidarity exist among Americans? A group of sociologists, political theorists, and social historians explore ideological differences, theoretical disputes, social processes and institutional change.
Author: Jeffrey Weeks
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1509508880
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 246
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Book Description
Until the 1970s the history of sexuality was a marginalized practice. Today it is a flourishing field, increasingly integrated into the mainstream and producing innovative insights into the ways in which societies shape and are shaped by sexual values, norms, identities and desires. In this book, Jeffrey Weeks, one of the leading international scholars in the subject, sets out clearly and concisely how sexual history has developed, and its implications for our understanding of the ways we live today. The emergence of a new wave of feminism and lesbian and gay activism in the 1970s transformed the subject, heavily influenced by new trends in social and cultural history, radical sociological insights and the impact of Michel Foucault’s work. The result was an increasing emphasis on the historical shaping of sexuality, and on the existence of many different sexual meanings and cultures on a global scale. With chapters on, amongst others, lesbian, gay and queer history, feminist sexual history, the mainstreaming of sexual history, and the globalization of sexual history, What is Sexual History? is an indispensable guide to these developments.
