Identity formation for asexual people can be complicated by limited societal awareness of asexualities. Consequently, people who eventually identify on the asexuality spectrum often adopt other sexual identities in their early lives. In this paper, we extend sexual identity development theory by analyzing the identity trajectories of asexual-spectrum people who once identified as bisexual or pansexual. Quantitative data suggests that about half of asexual-spectrum respondents once identified as bisexual or pansexual and a third closely associate with bisexual or pansexual terminology. Qualitative data supports these findings, revealing that bisexuality, pansexuality, and asexuality are not always seen as mutually exclusive categories by asexual individuals. We argue that the intelligibility of bi-/pansexuality positions them as identity pathways for many asexual-spectrum individuals who experience equal (albeit little to no) attraction toward people of any gender.
American popular culture was established to appease a white audience and continues to operate in such a manner. This pervasive white gaze in the entertainment industry manifests in anti-Black depictions and ideologies. Black celebrities have resisted this distinct form of racial oppression by overtly affirming their Black identity in entertainment spaces. To further explore this phenomenon, the present article examines: How do Black celebrities employ unapologetic Blackness as an embodied resistance tactic to challenge racial inequality in pop cultural spaces? We analyze five cases of contemporary celebrity activism across various pop cultural platforms (YouTube, film, sport, music, and television) and find that just as race is socially constructed, varying across social locations, resistance to racial oppression also varies depending on the site in which it occurs. We further argue that Black celebrities’ embodied resistance converts pop cultural spaces into social movement scenes, thus transforming moments of entertainment into opportunities for political mobilization.
Identity formation for asexual people can be complicated by limited societal awareness of asexualities. Consequently, people who eventually identify as asexual often adopt other sexual identities in their early lives. In this paper, we extend sexual identity development theory by analyzing the identity trajectories of asexual people who once identified as bisexual or pansexual. Quantitative data suggests that about half of asexual respondents once identified as bisexual or pansexual and a third closely associate with bisexual or pansexual terminology. Qualitative data supports these findings, revealing that bisexuality, pansexuality, and asexuality are not always seen as mutually exclusive categories by asexual individuals. We argue that the intelligibility of bi-/pansexuality positions them as identity pathways for many asexual individuals who experience equal (albeit little to no) attractions toward men and women.
Asexuality is often defined as some degree of being void of sexual attraction, interest, or desire. Black asexual people have been made invisible, silent, or pathologized in most fiction, scholarly literature, and mainstream LGBTQ movements. Claire Kann’s 2018 young adult romance novel, Let’s Talk About Love, explores Black asexuality at the intersection of race and (a)sexuality. Through the story of the Black, bi-romantic, asexual, 19 year-old college student Alice Johnston, this text illuminates the diversity of Black sexuality in the Black Diaspora. Using a Black feminist sociological literary analysis to complete a close reading of the novel, I interrogate what Let’s Talk about Love offers for defining a Black asexual politic. To consider Black asexual politics beyond the controlling images of the asexual Mammy figure, and not merely in juxtaposition to the hypersexual Jezebel, calls us to instead center agency and self-definition. This project seeks to answer what Conscious Black Asexuality is, why it is a necessary concept for asexuality studies and the Diaspora, where we locate Black asexuality in Black history, and how Let’s Talk about Love by Claire Kann presents a depiction of Black agentic queerness that reclaims agency and intimacy within one’s sexual politics.
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