Julia Laite I’ve often said that researching prostitution makes me more of a labour historian than a historian of sexuality. Despite having typically been lumped into the same categories as homosexuality and other perceived sexual deviances, women who sold sex in the past connected their actions not to their sexuality but to […]
Tag: female sexuality
Beards, Real Men, and Poseurs: male sexuality and fashion since around 1900
Julia Laite A recent post by regular blogger Nikki Daniels (‘An open letter to bearded hipsters’) that has made the usual rounds of facebook and twitter has got me thinking about how male fashion has long been central to the way we define what it means to be a ‘real’ man. The blogger wrote about […]
Sex and the King: Rumours, Reputation and the Problem of Royal Adultery in Medieval England
Katherine Harvey The first few weeks of 2014 have seen a flurry of media reports about the private lives of world leaders both past and present, from Bill Clinton and Tony Blair to François Hollande and Barack Obama. Such fascination with the alleged sexual exploits of political leaders is often […]
The Censorship of Female Pleasure: Cleland, Charlie Countryman, Cunnilingus
Katelyn Dykstra Dykerman What is it about a woman enjoying herself that is so threatening? It is not an idle question. Female pleasure, and female sexuality, seem to be cause for confusion, as well as a particular kind of hand-wringing, censor-inducing, violence-spurring anxiety. A few months ago, Evan Rachel Wood took to twitter […]
A Second Valentine’s Day: Japan’s ‘White Day’
On Valentine’s Day, women give presents to men, while on White Day, men return the favor.
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