Managed Not Missing

Young Women’s Discourses of Sexual Desire Within a Postfeminist Heterosexual Marketplace

Dados Bibliográficos

ID12005247
AutoresAmy Brown-Bowers (Toronto Metropolitan University), Amy Brown‐Bowers (Toronto Metropolitan University, autor correspondente), Maria Gurevich (Toronto Metropolitan University), Alexander T Vasilovsky (Toronto Metropolitan University), Stephanie Cosma (0000-0002-9167-2237, Toronto Metropolitan University), Sarde Matti (University of Toronto)
Ano2015
Volume39
Fascículo3
Páginas320-336
Data de publicação2015-01-12
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoPsychology of Women Quarterly (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0361-6843 • E-ISSN: 1471-6402
EditoraSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0361684314567303
OpenAlexW2157632787
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas14
Referências citadas87

Our article describes findings from a project exploring sexual agency and desire among young women, focusing on the negotiation of sexuality within relationship contexts. Adopting a social constructionist framework, we used discourse analysis to examine semi-structured, audio-taped interviews with 39 Canadian young women (aged 18–26). Three related interpretive repertoires were identified, namely, (a) Sex as Relationship Hygiene (i.e., beneficial to the health of one’s relationship), (b) Sex as Exercise-esque (i.e., part of a wellness regime), and (c) Sex as Economy Exchange (i.e., a commodifiable practice within the heterosexual marketplace). Desire was not absent from participants’ accounts, however, it was channeled into specific forms of sexual expression and mediated by multiple and competing cultural imperatives. The interpretive repertoires provided spaces for agentic sex within which subjective sexual desire was not the primary motive but rather was subordinate to a rhetoric of self- and relationship improvement as a key register of sexuality. We discuss these findings in the context of postfeminist directives about sexual desirability and proficiency that young women must traverse as they develop ideas about successful female sexuality within heterosexual relationships

Agency (philosophy · Context (archaeology · Developmental psychology · Human sexuality · Negotiation · Social science · Sociology · Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health · Gender Studies · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Psychology · Sexuality, Behavior, and Technology · Social Psychology