1st Edition

Sexploitation Sexual Profiling and the Illusion of Gender

By Michèle Alexandre Copyright 2015

    Michèle Alexandre’s innovative study examines how sexual profiling represses, oppresses, and hinders various aspects of life for both genders, and explores the ways in which the law and the community can help eradicate the practice of sexual profiling. Alexandre defines "sexploitation" as the perpetuation of myths and stereotypical notions regarding men and women in order to further an agenda of oppression and subordination in certain spheres of society. The most popular means through which this sexploitation is achieved is through a method Alexandre coins as "sexual profiling." She argues that sexual profiling ultimately stifles the growth of our society by creating inefficient as well as oppressive systems, and that its eradication can help increase the productivity as well as the morale of society.

    Alexandre opens the book by exploring in detail the various ways in which normative views of gender are constructed and perpetuated through media and societal norms. She then focuses on the ways in which recent legal opinions and developments contribute to perpetuate these restrictive and oppressive norms. Finally, Alexandre outlines a plan to help eliminate the presence of these destructive norms and attitudes from different sectors of society.

    Selected Contents:Introduction Chapter 1. Sexual Profiling Defined Part I: Roots and Tools of Profiling Chapter 2. De-Gendering Men: Sexual Profiling and Masculinity Chapter 3. Ground Zero of the Battle: Sexual Profiling in the K-12 Setting Chapter 4. The Body Revisited, Again Chapter 5. What is in A Name? Who are You Calling a B****? Chapter 6. What Approach to Prostitution and Sex Work Tells Us about Persistence of the Madonna/Whore and Men/Effeminate Dichotomies Part II: Overcoming the Use of Law as a Conduit for Sexual Profiling Chapter 7. When the Ideal of Womanhood and Criminal Law Collide: Perpetuation of Vulnerable Women as Deviant Chapter 8. Rape Law and Sexual Profiling Chapter 9. Employment Law and Sexual Profiling Chapter 10. Other Forms of Profiling in Grooming Standards Chapter 11. Family Law and Sexual Profiling Chapter 12. Inheritance Law and Sexual Profiling Part III: What Now? A Cross Sectional Model for Reversing The Status Quo Chapter 13. The Personal as Political and Political as Personal: The Status Quo Chapter 14. Moving Forward Epilogue. Toward Individual Accountability Index

    Biography

    Michèle Alexandre is Professor of Law and Jessie D. Puckett, Jr. Lecturer at the University of Mississippi School of Law. Professor Alexandre’s prior professional experience includes serving as a civil rights attorney with Chestnut Sanders Sanders Pettaway Campbell & Albright L.L.C. in Selma, AL—where she worked, among many discrimination cases, on both iterations of the Black Farmers class action suit. She served as an Associate in the Corporate Real Estate Department of the Debevoise & Plimpton law firm; and as a Law Clerk for the Hon. John P. Fullam, U.S. Eastern District Court of Pennsylvania.

    Alexandre was named one of Ebony Magazine’s Top 100 influential African Americans of 2013 and one of the 50 "Most Influential Minority Law Professors 50 Years of Age or Younger" by Lawyers of Color Magazine. The first black woman valedictorian of Colgate University, she earned her Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School in 2000. She has received Fulbright and Watson Fellowships.