Rights, Responsibilities and Citizenship in Heterosexual Women's Talk about Sex: Promoting women's sexual health and safety
Joanne Bryant
National Centre in HIV Social Research, University of New South Wales, NSW
PP: 277 - 286
Abstract
This paper draws on qualitative data from eighteen interviews with heterosexual women about their experiences of sex with men. Drawing on ideals of individualism and free choice, women construct a citizenship discourse in which they and others are positioned as active sexual subjects with rights and responsibilities to sexual choice, pleasure and fulfilment.
Critical examination of respondents' discourse reveals how it is profoundly gendered, based on masculine forms of sexual desire and masculine understandings of pleasure.
The paper argues that, despite its gendered nature, the inherent reciprocity of the citizenship discourse (as produced through the link between rights and responsibilities) generates the possibility for women to negotiate their sexual freedom and promote their sexual health and safety.
Keywords
sociology, feminine sexuality, heterosexual, citizenship, discourse
References
Albury K (2001) Full-body-mega-kundalinigasm: 'sacred' sex and sexual politics. Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies 15(2):201-215.
Albury K (2002) Yes Means Yes: Getting Explicit about Heterosex, Sydney: Allen and Unwin.
Connell R (1995a) Masculinities, Sydney: Allen and Unwin.
Connell RW (1995b) Democracies of pleasure: thoughts on the goals of radical sexual politics. In L Nicholson and S Seidman (eds) Social Postmodernism: Beyond Identity Politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Cowie C and Lees S (1981) Slags or drags. Feminist Review 9:17-31.
Denzin NK (1989) The Research Act: A Theoretical Introduction to Sociological Method, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Dowsett GW (1996) Practicing Desire: Homosexual Sex in the Era of AIDS, Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Gilfoyle J, Wilson J and Brown (1992) Sex, organs and audiotape: A discourse analytic approach to talking about heterosexual sex and relationships. Feminism and Psychology 2(2):209-230.
Holland J, Ramazanoglu C, Scott S, Sharpe S and Thomson R (1991) Pressure, resistance, empowerment: Young women and the negotiation of safer sex. In P Aggleton, G Hart and P Davies (eds) AIDS: Rights, Risk and Reason, London: The Falmer Press.
Holland J, Ramazanoglu C, Scott S, Sharpe S and Thomson R (1992) Risk, power and the possibility of pleasure: Young women and safer sex. AIDS Care 4(3):273-283.
Hollway W (1984) Gender difference and the production of subjectivity. In J Henriques, W Hollway, C Urwin, C Venn and V Walkerdine (eds) Changing the Subject: Psychology, Social Regulation and Subjectivity, London: Methuen and Company, pp.227-263.
Hollway W (1989) Subjectivity and Method in Psychology: Gender, Meaning and Science, London: Sage Publications.
Kippax S, Crawford J, Waldby C and Benton P (1990) Women negotiating heterosex: Implications for AIDS prevention. Women's Studies International Forum 13(6):533-542.
Kitzinger J (1995) 'I'm sexually attractive but I'm powerful': young women negotiating sexual reputation. Women's Studies International Forum 18(2):187-196.
Labov W (1982) Speech actions and reactions in personal narrative. In D Tannen (ed) Analyzing Discourse: Text and Talk, Washington DC: Georgetown University Press, pp.219 247.
Lear D (1995) Sexual communication in the age of AIDS: The construction of risk and trust among young adults. Social Science and Medicine 41(9):1311-1323.
Leca J (1992) Questions on citizenship. In C Mouffe (ed) Dimensions of Democracy, London: Verso.
Lister R (1997) Citizenship: Towards a feminist analysis. Feminist Review 57: 28-48.
Marshall TH (1950) Citizenship and Social Class, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Maxwell C and Boyle M (1995) Risky heterosexual practices amongst women over 30: Gender, power and long term relationships. AIDS Care 7(3):277-293.
Plummer K (1995) Telling Sexual Stories: Power, Change and Social Worlds, London: Routledge.
Potts A (2000) The essence of the hard on: Hegemonic masculinity and the cultural construction of 'erectile dysfunction'. Men & Masculinities 3(1):85-103.
Potts A (2001) The man with two brains: Hegemonic masculine subjectivity and the discursive construction of the unreasonable penis-self. Journal of Gender Studies 10(2):145-156.
Potts A (2002) The Science/Fiction of Sex: Feminist Deconstruction and the Vocabularies of Heterosex, East Sussex: Routledge.
Richardson EH and Turner BS (2001) Sexual, intimate or reproductive citizenship? Citizenship Studies 5(3): 329-338.
Richardson D (1998) Sexuality and citizenship. Sociology 32(1):83-100.
Richardson D (2000) Constructing sexual citizenship: Theorising sexual rights. Critical Social Policy 20(1): 105-135.
Riessman CK (1993) Narrative Analysis, Newbury Park: Sage Publications.
Roberts C, Kippax S, Waldby C and Crawford J (1995) Faking it: the story of 'ooh'! Women's Studies Forum International 18(5/6):523-532.
Ryan A (2000) Feminism and sexual freedom in an age of AIDS. Sexualities 4(1):91-107.
Summers A (1994) Damned Whores and God's Police, Ringwood: Penguin.
Tiefer L (2002) The emerging global discourse of sexual rights. Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy 28(5):439-444.
Ussher JM (1994) Theorizing female sexuality: Social constructionist and post structuralist accounts. In PYL Choi & P Nicolson (eds) Female Sexuality: Psychology, Biology and Social Context, Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf, pp.149 173.
Valentine K (2005) Citizenship, identity, blood donation. Body and Society 11(2):113-128.
Warr DJ (2001) The importance of love and understanding: speculation on romance in safe sex health promotion. Women's Studies International Forum 24(2):241-252.
Weeks J (1998) The sexual citizen. Theory, Culture and Society 15(3-4):35-52.
Yuval-Davis N (1991) The citizenship debate: women, ethnic processes and the state. Feminist Review 39: 58-68.
eContent Home
