Manifesting maturity

Gendered sexual intimacy and becoming an adult

Bibliographic Data

ID18950979
AuthorsC Dalessandro (0000-0003-3780-8647, University of Colorado Boulder, corresponding author)
Year2019
Volume22
Issue1-2
Pages165-181
Publication date2019-02-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSexualities (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1363-4607 • E-ISSN: 1461-7382
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/1363460717699779
OpenAlexW2621110461
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited29

In this article, I explore how 28 class-advantaged, young “emerging” adult women and men in the USA utilize understandings of their own intimate lives to make sense of themselves as adults in progress. Young adults who envision normative relationship futures (monogamous marriage) use a cultural story of coming to realize the importance of emotional monogamy over sex in order to make sense of themselves as becoming mature (getting closer to marriage). However, women’s accounts reveal difficulty in the implementation of this dominant understanding in their own lives. Since women are always expected to be naturally emotional, regardless of age or personal preferences, realizing the importance of emotions in relationships does not apply well to their experiences. In an attempt to reconcile the conflict between gender and the dominant cultural story, women simultaneously police other women’s sexual activity and frame their own casual sex experiences in emotional terms. Dominant understandings of coming to maturity through realizing the importance of emotions work best for men only, leaving questions as to how women might make sense of themselves as mature (or not) through their relationships

Casual · Developmental psychology · Futures contract · Narrative · Normative · Sociology · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Gender Studies · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Psychology · Social Psychology · Work-Family Balance Challenges

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