No abstract

Adding to a small but growing feminist literature, this article critically examines popular, contemporary American sex manuals from a feminist social constructionist perspective, focusing specifically on how these manuals construct gender and sexual norms. With notable exceptions, the majority of these manuals are geared toward white, heterosexual, middle-class, able-bodied, and cisgendered audiences. We argue that in addition to positioning sexual activity as a biological, essential (albeit gendered) human need, and as the ultimate path to individual fulfillment and empowerment, a new rationale for the importance of sex (and working on sexual improvement) is now prominent in contemporary sex manuals. Reflecting the “healthicization” of sex in the post-Viagra era, authors frame frequent pleasurable sexual activity as an important factor in the maintenance of health and wellness, an argument that gives further weight to the importance of “sex work” as a fundamental aspect of particularly women’s work in heterosexual relationships. These findings are in keeping with a growing body of literature that highlights the rise of the “sex as health” discourse as well as literature examining the growing pressure to master, improve, and work on sex.

This article explores the relationship between contemporary asexual lives and compulsory sexuality, or the privileging of sexuality and the marginalizing of nonsexuality. Drawing on 30 in-depth interviews, I identify four ways the asexually identified individuals in this study saw themselves as affected by compulsory sexuality: pathologization, isolation, unwanted sex and relationship conflict, and the denial of epistemic authority. I also identify five ways these asexually identified individuals disrupted compulsory sexuality: adopting a language of difference and a capacity to describe asexuality; deemphasizing the importance of sexuality in human life; developing new types of nonsexual relationships; constituting asexuality as a sexual orientation or identity; and engaging in community building and outreach. I argue that some of these practices offer only a limited disruption of compulsory sexuality, but some of these practices pose a radical challenge to sexual norms by calling into question the widespread assumption that sexuality is a necessary part of human flourishing.

In this article, I explore the intersections between gender and asexuality, drawing on data collected from in-depth interviews with 30 asexually-identified individuals living in the United States. I examine the differential effects that gendered sexual norms have on asexually-identified men and women and begin to explore the relationship between asexuality, gender non-conformity, and trans* identities. Based on these findings, I argue that while white, middle-class asexually-identified men may live in greater conflict with dominant gendered sexual norms than white, middle-class asexually-identified women, the sexual autonomy of these asexually-identified men – specifically their right to refuse sexuality – may be greater than the sexual autonomy of these asexually-identified women.