1st Edition
Sexuality and Its Discontents Meanings, Myths, and Modern Sexualities
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.
Biography
Jeffrey Weeks is currently Professor in Social Relations at the University of the West of England, Bristol. He has previously held research and teaching posts at the London School of Economics and at the Universities of Essex, Kent and Southampton. Since the early 1970s he has researched, taught and written widely on the theory, history and politics of sexuality. He is the editor of ‘History Workshop Journal, and his previous books include Coming Out: Homosexual Politics in Britain from the 19th Century to the Present, Sex Politics and Society: the Regulation of Sexuality since 1800, Sexuality, Between the Acts with Kevin Porter and Against Nature.
'What is so helpful about Jeffrey Weeks's book is that it provides a thinking cap beneath which to understand the complete range of discontented sexual prejudice and polemic of our time.' - New Society
