G W Dowsett
Biographic Data
| ID | 11378 |
|---|---|
| NAME | G W Dowsett |
| GIVEN NAMES | G W |
| FAMILY NAME | Dowsett |
| SIGNATURE | DOWSETT G W |
| AFFILIATIONS | La Trobe University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0841-3964 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 60 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 137 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 60 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1980 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
‘Synced as a couple’
While most research on digital sex toys to date has focussed on their affordances and marketing, or issues of data governance and privacy, research on user experience is limited. This article centres the accounts of 11 interviewees who used digital sex devices within mostly heterosexual relations, and often for remote partnered sex. We demonstrate how digital sex toys offer creative potential and possibilities for sexual pleasure and connection, …
Sex on screens
Frequently referred to as 'sexting' or 'amateur pornography', digital sexual images and videos form an increasingly common part of adult sexual relationships. However, the vocabulary available to speak about these practices is limited, with 'sexting' often associated with young people in negative terms. This study is based on 23 interviews with adults in Australia who are 25 years and older. It explores the language adults employ to discuss and c…
LGBTQI Sexual Well-Being and Embodiment After Cancer
This study examined lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex (LGBTQI) cancer patients' sexual well-being post-cancer, and the associations between sexual well-being and social support, physical concerns, distress, quality of life (QOL), and coping. We used a mixed-methods approach, including 430 surveys and 103 interviews, representing a range of tumor types, sexual and gender identities, age groups, and intersex status. The findin…
Rethinking Risk in Adults’ Engagement with Sexual Digital Imagery
Introduction Camera-equipped smartphones and other devices allow people to capture and share images directly with others in ways that are spontaneous, instant and relatively inexpensive. Such sharing is a common part of modern sexual intimacies, despite media and educational discourses warning of potential risks. Methods This paper reports on a qualitative study in which we interviewed 23 Australian adults about the ways in which they used with d…
Men, bodywork, health and the potentiality of performance and image-enhancing drugs
In a qualitative study on masculinity, embodiment and sexuality, we interviewed men who were recreational gym-goers about their bodywork practices in Melbourne, Australia. We also asked whether the men had used performance and image-enhancing drugs (PIEDs) as an adjunct to their bodywork practices. While none had used PIEDs, all were considering, or had considered, using them. We found that participants held varying opinions on PIED use and those…
‘Damn, Channing Tatum can move!’
This paper explores how women think about men’s bodies as objects of desire. It reports on one part of a larger qualitative study on men’s bodywork practices in contemporary Australia. Drawing on material from three focus groups with 24 Australian women of varying ages, sexual orientations and backgrounds, the paper considers how women experience, understand and reflect on their desire for men and men’s bodies. It also explores themes such as the…
Stigma as understood by key informants
Priorities and practices of risk reduction among gay and bisexual men in Australia who use crystal methamphetamine for sex
The “Gay Plague” Revisited
Making The Difference
First published in 1982, Making the Difference has become a classic in the study of education and of Australian society. Hailed on publication as 'certainly the most interesting book written about Australian schools in a very long time [and] arguably the most important', it has since been recognised as one of the 10 most influential works of Australian sociology, 'not just a major argument, and a 'classic' point of reference, [but] an event, an i…
Destabilising the ‘problem’ of chemsex
It's like getting an Uber for sex
The HIV epidemic in the Philippines has been expanding rapidly, with most newly diagnosed cases occurring among 'men who have sex with men' (MSM). New social contexts of HIV are evident in the evolving phenomenon of more MSM seeking partners online via social networking applications ('apps'). This study examines findings from a virtual ethnography of app use among MSM, focus group discussions with community-based healthcare workers, and key infor…
MSM (Men Who Have Sex with Men)
This entry examines the origins of the now‐common epidemiological term “MSM,” or “men who have sex with men,” in relation to the global HIV pandemic and to the place of gay men and modern gay communities within it. Since the term gained global currency in the HIV/AIDS field, it has gained wide use in epidemiology, social science, and international public health. Its problems, however, remain
Untangling the conflation of ‘young adults’ and ‘young people’ in STI and sexual health policy and sex education
Young adults, aged 18–30 years, are disproportionally mentioned in sexually transmissible infection surveillance data both in Australia and internationally. This contributes to categorising young adults as an ‘at risk’ group in health policy. How young adults are framed in policy, and what informs this, have direct implications for policy priorities and responses, including the development of health promotion programmes. In this paper, we provide…
Reconsidering the ‘sexual century’
The rush to risk when interrogating the relationship between methamphetamine use and sexual practice among gay and bisexual men
Sexual Rehabilitation After Prostate Cancer Through Assistive Aids
The use of assistive aids in sexual rehabilitation after prostate cancer (PCa) was examined in 124 gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (GBM) and 225 heterosexual men. GBM were significantly more likely to use assistive aids (79% versus 56%), to try multiple assistive aids ( M = 1.65 versus M = 0.83) including medication, penile injection, penile implant, vacuum pump, and nonmedical sex aids, and to seek information about sexual reh…
Men's Sexual and Relational Adaptations to Erectile Dysfunction After Prostate Cancer Treatment
This study investigated how men adapt to erectile dysfunction and other sexual side-effects of prostate cancer treatment. The study recruited nonheterosexual and heterosexual men using an anonymous, international, online survey (N = 558). This article focuses on a qualitative analysis of answers (n = 348) to one open-ended question on sexual practices after treatment. Five themes emerged: (a) recovery of erectile function; (b) reframing sexual pr…
Use of antiretroviral treatment among people living with HIV in Australia between 1997 and 2012
Current international targets aim for 90% of people diagnosed with HIV to be on antiretroviral treatment (ART). This paper aims to identify sociodemographic and attitudinal factors associated with ART non-use over time in three samples of Australian people living with HIV (PLHIV). Data for this paper were derived from an Australian cross-sectional survey of PLHIV that was repeated at three different time points: 1997, 2003, and 2012. There were a…
Abjection. Objection. Subjection
In coining the term 'post-AIDS' some 20 years ago, I was noting the dissolution of a singular and unified experience of HIV and AIDS for gay communities that had been the case until that time. Not only were HIV-positive and HIV-negative gay men having increasingly different experiences, but divergent trajectories were opening up. Since then, many other factors have come into play, for example age and generation; the ascendancy of the biomedical a…
Threat of Sexual Disqualification
Gay and bisexual (GB) men with prostate cancer (PCa) have been described as an "invisible diversity" in PCa research due to their lack of visibility, and absence of identification of their needs. This study examined the meaning and consequences of erectile dysfunction (ED) and other sexual changes in 124 GB men with PCa and 21 male partners, through an on-line survey. A sub-sample of 46 men with PCa and seven partners also took part in a one-to-o…
Gay and bisexual men’s interest in marriage
Same-sex marriage is a widely debated issue, including in Australia. This study used an online anonymous survey, with free-text responses, to investigate romantic and sexual relationships among Australian gay and bisexual men. We sought to identify what proportion of such men intended to marry their primary regular partner if marriage was made legally available to same-sex couples in Australia, as well as factors associated with intention or non-…
The price of pulchritude, the cost of concupiscence
Research and scholarship on sexuality has grown exponentially over the last 60 years; but what is this 'sexuality' that so fascinates us. During those 60 years, three academic traditions or paradigms have emerged and evolved to provide that main ways we understand sexuality. These are: (1) sexology; (2) sex research; and (3) critical sexuality studies. These paradigms do not always agree; at times, they are incommensurable in the picture of sexua…
And next, just for your enjoyment!’
In the 1976 sci-fi film Logan's Run, actor Michael York, relaxing in a fetching caftan after a day hunting 'Runners', logs-in to the 'Circuit', a de- and re-materialisation technology that allows those seeking sex to select partners. Logan's first candidate, a young man, is passed over with a smile. The second is co-star Jenny Agutter; she is accepted and we join a sexual ride in the future. Online dating sites such as Gaydar® and RSVP® would see…
‘Dirty work’ down under
This commentary considers the key arguments of Janice Irvine's article as they pertain to Australia's sexuality researchers. It also discusses other sexuality research outside the USA and suggests that sexuality research may be a particular problem for the USA but some of the same issues apply elsewhere
Gender Relations in Secondary Schooling
S. Kessler, D. J. Ashenden, R. W. Connell, G. W. Dowsett, Gender Relations in Secondary Schooling, Sociology of Education, Vol. 58, No. 1, Critical Sociology of Education: International Studies (Jan., 1985), pp. 34-48
Reaching Men who have Sex with Men in Australia. An Overview of Aids Education
This paper outlines the principles underlying the Australian AIDS strategy and offers an explanation for its success in reducing the spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) among homosexual and bisexual men in Australia's gay communities. A brief outline of the AIDS education activities offered by the gay‐community AIDS organisations is followed by results from the Social Aspects of the Prevention of AIDS (SAPA) research project based at…
Some Considerations on Sexuality and Gender in the Context of Aids
Gender has become a major conceptual tool for understanding the evolving HIV pandemic globally. As such, it has provided a powerful way to see the structure of relations between men and women as central to various epidemics, and added weight to our understanding of HIV infection as not simply an individual experience of disease. Yet, as a concept, gender has its blind spots. This paper argues that there are four issues central to our understandin…
Dangerous desires and post-queer HIV prevention
HIV/Aids and constructs of gay community
This paper reports on the methodology of a comparative study of three gay communities in Australia as they struggle with HIV/AIDS. The study focused on the pedagogy and practice of HIV/AIDS education for disease prevention and for health maintenance for people living with HIV/AIDS, through the investigation of three problematics: (1) constructs of 'community'; (2) the centrality of gay community-based health educators; and (3) the relations of ga…
Facing the Epidemic
A 1986-87 field survey of 535 gay and bisexual men in Australia examined changes in social relationships and in sexual conduct in response to the HIV epidemic. Results show the framework of sexual relationships changing little, though many men have moved between types of relationships. Reducing the incidence of sexual contact and being more selective about partners are common. Widespread change towards safe sex is reported; the repertoire is cont…
I'll show you mine, if you'll show me yours
There's No Teleology to it; It's Just about the Spirit of Play”
The certainties that characterized modern intimate life, and supported a hegemonic male sexuality defined by action and virility, are less present in contemporary men's intimate lives. In-depth interviews with ten heterosexual and gay men were conducted to explore how they organize their sexual and relational lives in contemporary Australia. Participants were committed to a “late” modern notion of intimacy characterized by reciprocity, and placed…
Male Circumcision and HIV Prevention
At the XVI International Conference on AIDS in Toronto in August 2006, assurances that the world was succeeding in fighting AIDS appeared shaky, or at least part of a new positive global “spin” pro
Good gay men don’t get “Messy”
Threat of Sexual Disqualification
Gay and bisexual (GB) men with prostate cancer (PCa) have been described as an "invisible diversity" in PCa research due to their lack of visibility, and absence of identification of their needs. This study examined the meaning and consequences of erectile dysfunction (ED) and other sexual changes in 124 GB men with PCa and 21 male partners, through an on-line survey. A sub-sample of 46 men with PCa and seven partners also took part in a one-to-o…
Men, bodywork, health and the potentiality of performance and image-enhancing drugs
In a qualitative study on masculinity, embodiment and sexuality, we interviewed men who were recreational gym-goers about their bodywork practices in Melbourne, Australia. We also asked whether the men had used performance and image-enhancing drugs (PIEDs) as an adjunct to their bodywork practices. While none had used PIEDs, all were considering, or had considered, using them. We found that participants held varying opinions on PIED use and those…
Gay Men's Knowledge of HIV Transmission and ‘Safe’ Sex
The study described in this paper is part of a project assessing the impact of the HIV epidemic on 535 men who have sex with men. These men were surveyed about their knowledge of HIV, their sexual practices, other issues concerning the transmission of HIV, and AIDS. This paper focuses on these men's beliefs about HIV transmission, their perceptions of the safety of a number of sexual and social practices, and the factors influencing these percept…
It's like getting an Uber for sex
The HIV epidemic in the Philippines has been expanding rapidly, with most newly diagnosed cases occurring among 'men who have sex with men' (MSM). New social contexts of HIV are evident in the evolving phenomenon of more MSM seeking partners online via social networking applications ('apps'). This study examines findings from a virtual ethnography of app use among MSM, focus group discussions with community-based healthcare workers, and key infor…
Sexual Rehabilitation After Prostate Cancer Through Assistive Aids
The use of assistive aids in sexual rehabilitation after prostate cancer (PCa) was examined in 124 gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (GBM) and 225 heterosexual men. GBM were significantly more likely to use assistive aids (79% versus 56%), to try multiple assistive aids ( M = 1.65 versus M = 0.83) including medication, penile injection, penile implant, vacuum pump, and nonmedical sex aids, and to seek information about sexual reh…
LGBTQI Sexual Well-Being and Embodiment After Cancer
This study examined lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex (LGBTQI) cancer patients' sexual well-being post-cancer, and the associations between sexual well-being and social support, physical concerns, distress, quality of life (QOL), and coping. We used a mixed-methods approach, including 430 surveys and 103 interviews, representing a range of tumor types, sexual and gender identities, age groups, and intersex status. The findin…
Rethinking Risk in Adults’ Engagement with Sexual Digital Imagery
Introduction Camera-equipped smartphones and other devices allow people to capture and share images directly with others in ways that are spontaneous, instant and relatively inexpensive. Such sharing is a common part of modern sexual intimacies, despite media and educational discourses warning of potential risks. Methods This paper reports on a qualitative study in which we interviewed 23 Australian adults about the ways in which they used with d…
Losing my chestnut
Iam a sexuality activist, researcher and theorist, with 35 years of experience working, thinking, writing and debating in sexuality and gender politics, and 25 years of working in HIV/AIDS. I can talk about sex under water! For me, like everyone else the first time – losing my cherry – was an important moment marking a new phase of my life and I have talked with amusement about that moment with friends and in my work. I want to tell another tale …
Baring essentials
Class and Secondary Schooling
Class and Secondary Schooling
Gender Relations in Secondary Schooling
S. Kessler, D. J. Ashenden, R. W. Connell, G. W. Dowsett, Gender Relations in Secondary Schooling, Sociology of Education, Vol. 58, No. 1, Critical Sociology of Education: International Studies (Jan., 1985), pp. 34-48
Facing the Epidemic
A 1986-87 field survey of 535 gay and bisexual men in Australia examined changes in social relationships and in sexual conduct in response to the HIV epidemic. Results show the framework of sexual relationships changing little, though many men have moved between types of relationships. Reducing the incidence of sexual contact and being more selective about partners are common. Widespread change towards safe sex is reported; the repertoire is cont…
Reaching Men who have Sex with Men in Australia. An Overview of Aids Education
This paper outlines the principles underlying the Australian AIDS strategy and offers an explanation for its success in reducing the spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) among homosexual and bisexual men in Australia's gay communities. A brief outline of the AIDS education activities offered by the gay‐community AIDS organisations is followed by results from the Social Aspects of the Prevention of AIDS (SAPA) research project based at…
Gay Men's Knowledge of HIV Transmission and ‘Safe’ Sex
The study described in this paper is part of a project assessing the impact of the HIV epidemic on 535 men who have sex with men. These men were surveyed about their knowledge of HIV, their sexual practices, other issues concerning the transmission of HIV, and AIDS. This paper focuses on these men's beliefs about HIV transmission, their perceptions of the safety of a number of sexual and social practices, and the factors influencing these percept…
Sustaining safe sex
OBJECTIVE: TO assess the maintenance of safe sexual practice. (We use the term 'safe' sex throughout the paper, since 'safe' is the term adopted by the Australian National Committee on AIDS). DESIGN: Maintenance was assessed by comparing sexual behaviour with both regular and casual partners reported in a 1986/1987 survey (time 1) with behaviour reported in a second survey in 1991 (time 2). METHOD: The 145 homosexually active participants were a …
I'll show you mine, if you'll show me yours
Rethinking Sex
Introduction, R.W. Connell and G.W. Dowsett Frameworks and questions in Australian sexuality research, Judith A. Allen AIDS and the discourses of sexuality, Dennis Altman unclean motion of the generative parts - frameworks in Western thought on sexuality, R.W. Connell and G.W. Dowsett Absolute sex? Unpacking the sexuality/gender relationship, Rosemary Pringle Sexuality and the state in time of epidemic, J.A. Ballard The present moment in sexual p…
Health Strategies of HIV-Infected, Homosexually Active Men in Sydney, Australia
Drawing from a sample of gay and bisexual men who participated in large-scale surveys, and exploring issues derived from a smaller-scale study on working-class gay men, this close-focus study explores the relation between sexual identity, attachment to gay community and responses to HIV infection. Ten long-term HIV-infected, homosexually active men were interviewed using the open-ended life history method. A typology of four health strategies des…
Practicing Desire
For more than a decade, gay men have faced a terrible crisis - the HIV epidemic and its consequence for many: AIDS. The epidemic coincided with the development of visible gay communities, distilled from cultural, political, and sexual activities, and claiming for homosexual men a recognition of the pleasures and prerogatives of same-sex love. These gay communities are substantial subcultures, often with a geographic focus and commercial infrastru…
I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours
Gay men occupy a strange position when masculinity is discussed or studied; neither truly inside nor entirely outside its domains. There is a growing gap between gay and non-gaymen and women, which this paper describes with regard to relations with women, differences to feminist thinking, concerns of daily life, dealing with the HIV/AIDS epidemic and, most troubling and difficult to resolve, with regard to sex. An international gay community has …
Queer theory, politics and HIV/Aids
Changing gender relations among young people
The worldwide epidemic of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) has affected different populations in different countries. Yet, every country has recognized the particular vulnerability of its young people to possible infection. This vulnerability is commonly thought to relate in the main to young people's assumed universal interest in sexual experimentation. Various studies have demonstrated not only both worrying levels of sexual risk-taking among…
Practicing Desire
Staking a Claim on History and Culture
Practicing Desire: Homosexual Sex in the Era of AIDS. GARY W. DOWSETT. Stanford CA: Stanford University Press, 1996; 322 pp. Same Sex, Different Cultures: Exploring Gay and Lesbian Lives. GILBERT HERDT. Boulder CO: Westview Press, 1997; 204 pp. Islamic Homosexualities: Culture, History and Literature. STEPHEN O. MURRAY and WILL ROSCOE, eds. New York: New York University Press, 1997; 330 pp. Sex and Sensibility: Stories of a Lesbian Generation. AR…
Commentary The indeterminate macro-social
The author discusses the first-ever study of male-to-male HIV-related sexual behavior in Fiji, Samoa, and Vanuatu, and the importance of sexual culture to HIV/AIDS education and research. The survey, based loosely upon Australian instruments, is attempting to document the HIV/AIDS knowledge, attitudes, social behaviors, and sex practices of homosexually active men to better target educational interventions for that population in the South Pacific…
HIV/Aids and constructs of gay community
(2001). HIV/AIDS and constructs of gay community: Researching educational practice within community-based health promotion for gay men. International Journal of Social Research Methodology: Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 205-223
HIV/Aids and constructs of gay community
This paper reports on the methodology of a comparative study of three gay communities in Australia as they struggle with HIV/AIDS. The study focused on the pedagogy and practice of HIV/AIDS education for disease prevention and for health maintenance for people living with HIV/AIDS, through the investigation of three problematics: (1) constructs of 'community'; (2) the centrality of gay community-based health educators; and (3) the relations of ga…
Queering the Interview
'Johnnie comes marching … where?' Australian gay men, masculinity, HIV/Aids and sex
Outsiders often see Australia as a place that has achieved a remarkable degree of tolerance for social and cultural difference. It has a reputation for a successful and enlightened national HIV/AIDS strategy and as an important gay tourist spot, particularly during Sydney's Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. Legalized sex between men in all jurisdictions has been achieved, most of it during the era of the HIV epidemic. Reforms in anti-discrimination law…
HIV/Aids and homophobia
This paper argues that the relationship between homophobia and HIV/AIDS is not as direct as is often assumed. This argument is pursued through an examination of the situation of gay men in Australia, a country where the HIV epidemic is largely confined to gay men, and Bangladesh, a country and culture where sex between men does not conform to categories of human sexuality privileged in Western theory. Both of these countries reveal something diff…
Some Considerations on Sexuality and Gender in the Context of Aids
Gender has become a major conceptual tool for understanding the evolving HIV pandemic globally. As such, it has provided a powerful way to see the structure of relations between men and women as central to various epidemics, and added weight to our understanding of HIV infection as not simply an individual experience of disease. Yet, as a concept, gender has its blind spots. This paper argues that there are four issues central to our understandin…
Baring essentials
Good gay men don’t get “Messy”
Male Circumcision and HIV Prevention
At the XVI International Conference on AIDS in Toronto in August 2006, assurances that the world was succeeding in fighting AIDS appeared shaky, or at least part of a new positive global “spin” pro
Sociology (48 works) · Psychology (46 works) · Gender Studies (43 works) · Medicine (30 works) · Human sexuality (27 works) · Political science (24 works) · Gender Studies (20 works) · Social Psychology (20 works) · LGBTQ Health, Identity, and Policy (19 works) · Sex work and related issues (18 works)