HISTSEX ARCHIVES: APRIL 1999
© Lesley Hall and list contributors
Date: Thu, 01 Apr 1999 10:54:43 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: medicine, homosexuality, identity; or, the time has not come
While Giovanni Dall'Orto has made some interesting and important points
about the problem of 'medicalising' Ulrichs, et al., by turning them
into doctors which they were not, it is still important to set out that
medicine (incl. sexology, neurology, psychoanalysis--as I would regard
Freud!--forensic medicine, venereology, etc) is a separate field of
discourse to homosexual rights activism. This is not to say that
medicine did not rearticulate the same kinds of concerns, or deal with
the problem in such a way that challenged the political activists'
ideas, or even colonise these political issues as medical ones. But as
these medical discourses are different to the political ones, it might
be problematic to suggest that the sexological discourses were purely
reactions to homosexual self identity; afterall, they have different
modes of construction, different facts, different theories, etc.
Thinking that emdicine was influenced purely and utterly by politics
sets up the idea that there is an influence from one social sphere to
another which is difficult to substantiate (although ths does *not* mean
that I have sympathy for the idea, as I htink that it has a certian
amount to offer). Harry Oosterhuis did it very nicely in his paper in
Rosario (ed), _Science and Homosexualities_, NY & London, 1997. And
from Oosterhuis' work we can get get a sense of medical rearticulation
of homosexual self identity in the 19th century. But there are counter
examples, such as Ellis and Symonds noting that many of their cases were
identifying themselves in terms of the medical theory. The same is the
case in some of the cases Ellis used in _Eonism_. This begins to get to
a picture of the relationship between medicine/science and
homosexuals/homosexual rights activity which is not unidirectional and
is quite complex; there is much cross-over between the fields.
Obviously one of the constraints here is that the fields of medicine
have to base their medical constructions of homosexuality on data of
some sort, and this often came from those who had already dealt with the
problem: Ulrichs, Kertbeny, etc.
Of course, as Giovanni Dall'Orto rightly pointed out, this does not mean
that one could include Ulrichs, Carpenter, Symonds, Kertbeny etc., as
doctors in their research into same sex desire/activity. Nor does it
mean, however, that one can suggest that the medicalisation of
homosexuality was *caused* by preceeding social interest into the
topic. Rather, the historian has to carefully map the differences,
cross-overs and other nuances which emerge as different fields (both
within the wider field of medicine and between 'medicine' and 'other
fields') struggle to create an orthdox (in Bourdieu's sense) discourse
about homosexuality. Until an orthodox opinion emerges (and I am not
sure that it ever will, and it certainly has not emerged to date), then
there are going to be series of boundary workings by different actors as
they struggle to create their discourses. This, to my mind, undermines
the position that behind the medical construction of homosexuality was a
homosexual rights activist, especially as some medicos, Havelock Ellis
for example, were medically trained, and were writing sexological texts
as a part of the homosexual liberation movement (for a good account of
Ellis' sexual politics as a part of a wider social reform movement, see
Chris Nottingham's forthcoming book on Ellis). This example detracts
from the previous notion that there were two separate fields, one
following the other.
Sorry, I think I started rambling!
Cheers, Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
Giovanni Dall'Orto :
Just for the sake of putting the record straight:
Benkert was neither a MD nor a sexologist: he was a writer, and a
homosexual activist (he actually coined the
word "homosexuality");
Ulrichs was not a sexologist: he was a jurist, and a homosexual activist
(he coined the word "uranism" & re.).
Krafft-Ebing was no sexologist: he was a neuropsychiatrist. He was
deeply influenced by Ulrich's ideas about
homosexuality.
Freud, eventually, was a neurologist. And he belongs to a generation
later.
You might have noticed that psychiatrists came AFTER homosexual
activists had spoken their mind.
Time has come, in my opinion, to ask whether the purpoted "medical
construcion of homosexuality" should not
be read the other way: i.e. as a social answer (a medical one, since the
traditional, religious one had proved too
weak) to the growth of a homosexual self-definition, identity and
activism; in other words, as a social answer to
the SELF-CONSTRUCTION of homosexuality by homosexuals themselves.
Actually, behind and before any "doctor" who is assumed to have
"invented" or "constructed" homosexuality,
one can always find a homosexual activist. Cherchez le pédé, really! :)
To date, the only answer to this objection of mine (and not of mine
alone, of course) has been just concealing
evidence by transforming homosexual activists such as Benkert or Ulrichs
into doctors, which they never were
nor ever dreamed of being.
Is this a serious way of making history? Distorting data?
How long shall we be victim of what at best is a myth, and at worst,
just a LIE?
Best wishes
Giovanni Dall'Orto
___________________________________________________________________Date: Wed, 31 Mar 1999 14:30:36 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Re: Impotency and Homosexuality
MillerJimE@aol.com wrote:
> Is this nausea, or merely frustration and futility?
> Jim Miller
>> In a message dated 03/30/1999 4:22:57 PM Central Standard Time,
> aquarius@well.com writes:
> << Wisdom of Sirach 30:20:
> Says that a eunuch is as nauseated by the act of embracing a girl as a sick
> man is at the sight of a table full of food: "He [the ill man] sees things
> with
> his eyes and groans, like a eunuch embracing a girl groans." >>
I could answer by providing a larger piece of the text of Wisdom of Sirach, to
set the verse above in proper context, or I could provide more examples of
"eunuchs" being defined as a group lacking desire for women, just like
homosexual men. What the heck, I'll do both.
For Lucian of Samosata (2nd century CE) the identification of eunuchs was
problematic (leaving artificial eunuchs aside for the moment), probably because
they did not differ from other citizens except in one respect: they lacked
potency with women. Thus in a dialogue entitled The Eunuch, he gives the
following method for identifying one: Get some women from a brothel and put him
in a room with them and have a trustworthy elderly gentleman judge stand by to
observe whether he is able to comingle and cohabit with them. (Eunuchus 12).
The Basilidians, a Christian sect of the second century CE, interpreted Matthew
19:12 in the following way, according to Clement of Alexandria:
"... when the apostles asked whether it was better not to marry, the Lord
replied: 'Not all receive this saying. For there are eunuchs, some by birth,
others by compulsion.' They interpret this saying this way: Some men from their
birth have a natural sense of revulsion from a woman ..."
Terence's play of the second century B-CE entitled The Eunuch concerned a young
man who poses as a eunuch in order to gain access to a household so he can rape
a girl he is infatuated with. The playwright, in an instance of foreshadowing,
has his main character state, after seeing the object of his desire (and before
getting the idea to pose as a eunuch): "From this moment I erase all women from
my mind. These vulgar beauties make me sick."
Finally, in the Book of Wisdom of Sirach, the verse I cited comes from the
following context (Sirach, i.e. Ecclesiasticus, 30:14-20):
>From Edgar Goodspeed's translation in _The Apocrypha_ (1938):
"A poor man who is well and has a strong constitution is better off than a rich
man who is afflicted in body. Health and a good constitution are better than any
amount of gold, and a strong body than untold riches. There is no greater wealth
than health of body, and there is no greater happiness than gladness of heart.
Death is better than a wretched life, and eternal rest than continual sickness.
Good things spread out before a mouth that is closed are like piles of food laid
on a grave. What good is an offering of fruit to an idol? It can neither eat nor
smell. That is the way with a man who is afflicted by the Lord: He sees things
with his eyes and groans, like a eunuch embracing a girl [groans]!" (In his
translation, Goodspeed omits the second "stenazon," or "groans," which is
present in the original.)
The analogy only works if the eunuch is nauseated by the female. A castrated man
may not be able to "eat" (or can't he?), but he is in any case able to "smell"
(please excuse the potential vulgarity). A eunuch, like a sick man, can do
neither.
Mark Brustman
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 01 Apr 1999 14:40:39 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: =?iso-8859-1?Q?Re:_Cherchez_le_p=E9d=E9?=
In-Reply-To: <Pine.OSF.3.95.990331130456.32448F-100000@is3.nyu.edu>
In 13.08 31/03/99 -0500, David F. Greenberg wrote:
Givoanni Dall'Orto is right to note that the late nineteenth-century
>psychiatric literature on homosexuality was preceded by the writings=20
of
>activists like Benkert and Ulrichs. However, they themselves did not
>originate the ideas that a same-sex orientation was innate. This can=20
be
>found in European writings in the early and middle part of the
nineteenth
>century, and in writings of the Italian Renaissance, and going back
even
>earlier, in classical antiquity. I doubt that all such writings could
be
>traced to homosexual activists. At least, this has not been done so far.
-
>David Greenberg, Sociology Department, New York University
I really thank David Greenberg for pointing out that even XIX century
activists were not the first ones to speak of same-sex-intercourse as the
result of a way of being rather than a way of behaving
(<underline>pace</underline> Foucault and his grandchildren).=20
This goes against commonly held prejudices about the purpoted "modern
construction of homosexuality". Actually, the very same Marquis de Sade
who wrote a "Conjecture sur le troisi=E8me sexe" was no "doctor", was not
"modern", and he was writing about the "third sex" (purpotedly created by
XIX century sexologists) in the wrong century - at least, if we agree
with what self-styling "social constructionists" claim.
I would make a fool of myself if I claimed there were gay activists in XV
century Europe. The very conception of "activist" is a modern one. (Well,
the very conception of "<bold>Europe</bold>" is, but this is another
matter).
Yet, although S.C. claim that "we" invented homosexuality, "we" invented
sexuality, we invented food, love, fire, water, cats dog and everything
else, there used to be life even before "we" were born. At least: so they
say.
However, people who "advocated" same-sex love as a noble one to be
tolerated and even appreciated by society lived and spoke their minds
during and before the Italian and European Renaissance. (To the topic I
devoted a paper appeared in the "Journal of homosexuality" some years
ago: "Socratic love as a disguise for same-sex love in the Italian
Renaissance", dealing with XV-XVI century. What I found is that commonly
held prejudices about a purpoted "epistemological break" between "XIX
centiry" and "before", simply goes against historical documents).
And if we are to believe to complaints from conservative people about how
"nowadays" sodomites boast about what they are (in Rome, in medieval
Europe & re.), visibility is not an invention of ours either.
That "activism" did not exist "then" is totally true. No one marched in a
parade holding a banner saying: "SODOMITE PRIDE".
Yet that in history only what Power has to say - as post-stucturalists
take from granted - is something that still is to be demonstrated (and in
my humble opinion will never be). Definitions of what homosexual
behaviours are and - above all - mean are ALWAYS negotiated between
society (or "Les Discours du pouvoir", if you prefer to tell it so) and
those individuals concerned. Who have their point of view to say.=20
Depending upon how much power they held, this point of view will be more
or less taken into consideration or not, and a compromise will, or will
not, be found.
It's as simple as that. Yet nobody seems to care, recently.
Time has come to listen to what cinaedi/ sodomites/ buggers/ homosexuals
had to say wherever "Power Discourses" were uttered. One-dimentional
vision of history (so called "Power discourses" dictate, people just
adact and conform) is not only wrong: this is clearly silly!
After all the often and wrogly cited Foucault spent his whole life
repeating that "les discours du pouvoir" pass THROUGH all of us. Which
imply that WE are the Power. Which means that if we want, then we can
fight back, change these very same discourses (rules, norms,
mentalities). This was - by the way - the rationale for his being a
left-wing activist (not a gay one, though: he was a man belongin to the
Power structure, after all).
What would we think of a historician from XXIII century studying
homosexuality in XX century only by reading juridical and medical and
Religious texts and nothing else?=20
Yet this is quite what has been done to date for the past. Shame on us.
Thanks for your sharp answer.
Muy best wishes.
Giovanni Dall'Orto
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 01 Apr 1999 18:16:12 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: "Medicine and homosexuality" by Crozier
Thanks to Ivan Crozier for his articulate answer (I am not quoting it
here because it was very long).
I notice in pleasure that he came very close to understanding my point of
view, notwithstanding the fact that I had not fully stated it.
My point of view is that in the purpoted "medical construction of
homosexuality", as in every historical phenomen, there was a
<underline>dialectical</underline> evolution. Homosexuals, or however you
prefere to define them (<underline>nomina NON sunt consequentia
rerum</underline>, so I don't care about labels) were the fist ones to
act when they realized the grasp from religion on "sexual" morality was
fading. This happened in last decades of XVIII century already.
Since evidence of this you can find in pamphlets, m=E9moirs, private
diaries, letters, you won't find this phenomenon described in medical
treatises nor in theological tomes (conservative by definition).
These first same-sex-love apologists "married" science hoping it could
give - at last - a liberating explanation about their way of being. A
"third sex", maybe: such an expression pre-exists its use by doctors by
at last one century.
That this hope proved vane is demonstrated by the very "medical
construction of homosexuality" phenomenon which is, and here too you
understand my point of view well, a social reaction to the growing
momentum of people from the "third sex" addressing themselves to doctors
to convince them to study the "riddle" (as Ulrichs called it) "of man-man
love" (lesbianism was not fully taken into consideration yet), and
addressing society to change its view about them.=20
(By the way you misunderstand me just when you have me say that this
phenomenon can be explained as "purely" a reaction to this. I know no
social phenomenon which is a "pure" reaction to one single issue. Society
is dynamic, and so are "discourses" about homosexuality).
=20
New mentalities in society created among early homosexual activists the
need for new definitions and prompted them to ask society new questions,
that shaped the medical discourse about homosexuality, that in turn
moulded homosexual self-definitions, which by reaction prompted new
theories to arise from homosexual scholars and activists, that caused the
counter-reaction brought by psychoanalisis to be greeted in favour (very
few scholars to date notice that Freud ATTACKS Hirschfeld in his "Three
essays")... Shall I carry on? :-) This phenomenon is still working
today, as I shall point out later in my mail.
This said, when I say "cherchez le p=E9d=E9" I am not joking: behind the
phenomenon of doctors & jurists & neurologists studying homosexuality
"seriously", there are ALSO homosexuals who sent unrequested memorials to
urge them to deal with the "riddle". Someone, as for instance Casper (one
of those credited with "inventing" homosexuality), even PUBLISHED one,
giving us an idea of what this kind of writings could be.
Why nobody to date paid attention to this fact? This is an interesting
question, since this is a "blind spot" in the research about this
period.
This all said, the fact that fifty years later homosexuals were eager to
describe themselves in medical terms comes in no surprise to me. They had
WANTED the possibility to do so, they had cooperated to have such a
possibility, so why should they have given it up?. Please keep in mind
that the alternative then was describing themselves in RELIGIOUS and
MORAL terms, or worse in JURIDICAL ones: if put in front of this option,
what would YOU choose?
We can have a very clear parallele example of how things worked, today,
in the Anglo-Saxon world that, having not adopted the Napol=E9on Code
principles about homosexuality, is still struggling today against
anti-homosexual laws that in Latin and Catholic Countries were abolished
between 1800 and 1850.
When I read any Usa gay magazine taking for granted without further
notice that homosexuality is a genetically determined condition (which
happend to me with "The Advocate" no later than yesterday night), I am
puzzled, since at 40 I did not decide yet whether homosexuality may have
a "cause" whatever. Yet I can understang why to them it is so important
make this point: if we have "born that way", why should laws punish us
for being born this way? In fact, Religious conservatives (including the
Pope) state "we have a choice", and we can convert. (It is just a matter
of will).
Furthermore, the very fact that social constructionism thrives in
Anglo-Saxon Countries (i.e. Common Law ones) alone comes, in my opinion,
from the need to set a clear separation between "then" and "now". Why
this should be done, I wondered many times, until I read the Supreme
Court "Hardwich" case sentence, quoting sodomy statutes enacted by Queen
Elisabeth (the FIRST, I mean). Oh, I see.
History is in no way indipendent from political concerns. Quite the
opposite: history belongs to politics, not to social sciences.
If Common-Law people need to make it clear that these statutes were
enacted against a set of people who are not us, who are separated from us
by an "epistemological break", then this is OK for me, even if this is
not true. But truth is a disposable commodity, under certain
circumstances. Only, I'd rather have them not try to export their
political concern elsewhere (as they are aggressively doing) by implying
that what happened in the Usa or in the UK had to happen worldwide, and
if it has not, it will.
In sum, my point is that so-called "modern homosexuality" is neither.
In fact, the overwhelming majority of homosexually enclined people in the
World do NOT live their homosexuality along the lines of the self-styled
"modern" homosexual. That these people should be dismissed as
"non-modern" of even worse as "non-homosexual" has to do with
ethnocentrism and racism, not with epystemology; the same being true - in
my opinion, of course - also for homosexual people living before the
alleged "medical construction" of the "modern homosexual".
A medical construction there was indeed, but it was neither the cause
for the birth of homosexuals, that pre-dated it, nor it was a worldwide
pheonomenon. Actually, it was a tool by which certain societies reacted
against homosexuals campaigning for abolition of laws punishing
homosexual acts between consenting adults. As such, it is a phenomenon
typical of those countries that did not adopt the Code Napol=E9on.
As for Italy (my Country, as you can see by my English :) ), it
decriminalized homosexuality partially in 1800-1820 and totally in 1889.
In this Country, as in all other Code Napol=E9on Countries, it was the
Catholic Church rather than the State to regulate and keep under control
homosexuals and homosexual acts.
Our problem, in fact, is not a social discourse trying to force us to
wear an identity which is socially constructed: quite the opposite, it is
a discourse saying that homosexuality is not something that
<underline>exists</underline>, is something <underline>you just
do</underline>, and there is no such a thing as an "essentially"
homosexual person.
As you see, Clinton may force my Country to bomb Serbia if he just wants,
but he can't change my Country's mentality about homosexuality nor its
traditional way to repress it.
Which shows, at last, that history counts, after all.
<bold>B</bold>est wishes.
Giovanni Dall'Orto
P.S. If you should reply, I won't be able to answer you before one week
or so: I'll be away from home for one week.
___________________________________________________________________
Date: 1 Apr 1999 19:35:44 -0000
From: Histsex:For historians of sexuality <histsex-owner@listbot.com>
Subject: Desire and identity
I've been reading the recent postings with great interest, and wondering
if part of the difficulty is the somewhat problematic use of 'homosexual'
to cover a range of potential same-sex preferences (from very occasional
to absolute) which the 'Kinsey' scale makes some endeavour to
differentiate. (It may be crude, as I've seen argued, but it's a major
jump from the either/or distinction.) And then I thought (given that
eunuchs have been, as it were, on the agenda) that although the Kinsey
scale accommodates, at least on the theoretical level, an absolute
equality of attraction to both sexes, it doesn't (as I recall) have a
'slot' for the individual who is equally unattracted to either sex. There
are people indifferent to or actively nauseated by the opposite sex who
are not, therefore, directing their desire to their own: they may (if this
possibility crosses their minds) be at least as indifferent or nauseated
(i.e. it is a revulsion from desire, intimacy, messy bodily entanglements
etc in general rather than specifically gendered bodies.
Lesley Hall
histsex-owner@listbot.com
lesleyah@primex.co.uk
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 01 Apr 1999 14:45:54 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Re: Desire and identity
Histsex:For historians of sexuality wrote:
> Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
>> I've been reading the recent postings with great interest, and wondering
> if part of the difficulty is the somewhat problematic use of 'homosexual'
> to cover a range of potential same-sex preferences (from very occasional
> to absolute) which the 'Kinsey' scale makes some endeavour to
> differentiate. (It may be crude, as I've seen argued, but it's a major
> jump from the either/or distinction.) And then I thought (given that
> eunuchs have been, as it were, on the agenda) that although the Kinsey
> scale accommodates, at least on the theoretical level, an absolute
> equality of attraction to both sexes, it doesn't (as I recall) have a
> 'slot' for the individual who is equally unattracted to either sex. There
> are people indifferent to or actively nauseated by the opposite sex who
> are not, therefore, directing their desire to their own: they may (if this
> possibility crosses their minds) be at least as indifferent or nauseated
> (i.e. it is a revulsion from desire, intimacy, messy bodily entanglements
> etc in general rather than specifically gendered bodies.
> Lesley Hall
> histsex-owner@listbot.com
> lesleyah@primex.co.uk
>
Well, that is precisely what I am trying to get at. Sexual activity, just on the
face of it, is very well described as a "messy bodily entanglement" regardless
of the gender(s) of the participants involved. Without specific biological
mechanisms of desire (pheromone receptors?) that establish a drive to have sex,
I wonder if the race would propagate at all! (Please excuse the immediate reach
for biological explanations, but I was a genetics major in college.)
Any number of factors, such as social conditioning, the weather, childhood
traumas, or a bad day at work can potentially block sexual desire (which is
different from the desire for intimacy). Just because biological mechanism(s)
exist which promote sexual desire, that does not mean we are slaves to our
genes. Many factors can interrupt lust. But what I am proposing is that sexual
arousal is _facilitated_ by mechanisms which direct the brain toward arousal,
and that some of these mechanisms are stimulated by some aspect of the gender of
the potential partner. In each person there would be mechanisms facilitating sex
with men, and other mechanisms facilitating sex with women (and most likely also
mechanisms operating regardless of the partner's gender).
It is here that I propose eunuchs and "born" lesbians are differentiated from
other people: they lack the biological mechanisms to feel lust for one sex -
which happens to be their respective counterpart sex in reproduction - and
therefore they view the prospect of sex with such a partner completely without
lust. Depending on one's view of the human body as clean or dirty, such a one
would find sex with the opposite sex either as indifferent as copulating with a
vegetable, or as repulsive as eating someone else's earwax. (On the other hand,
with lust operating, the inside of someone's ear can be quite tasty.)
There may be other distinct markers between gays and nongays which occur with
variable frequency, but the lack of desire for the opposite sex, in the presence
of same-sex desire, I think is as good a definition of gayness as any.
Your statement about the person "equally unattracted to either sex" brings up
the major sticking point that prevents full identification of gay men and
eunuchs: those (men) who have no desire for sexual intimacy, period, would also
meet the ancient definition of eunuchs, but of course they are not what some
would call "gay." Maybe in high school they would be called gay, but usually in
adult speech, "gay" people are interested in sex with somebody at least.
Mark Brustman
___________________________________________________________________
From: MillerJimE@aol.com
Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 22:19:57 EST
Subject: Re: Impotency and Homosexuality
I am afraid you lost me here. The idol is not nauseated, nor is the
inhabitant of the grave. Revulsion is not a common factor to the examples in
this passage. Futility is the common factor, especially in light of the
value system which emphasizes reproduction.
Jim Miller
In a message dated 04/01/1999 3:05:58 AM Central Standard Time,
aquarius@well.com writes:
<< Finally, in the Book of Wisdom of Sirach, the verse I cited comes from the
following context (Sirach, i.e. Ecclesiasticus, 30:14-20):
From Edgar Goodspeed's translation in _The Apocrypha_ (1938):
"A poor man who is well and has a strong constitution is better off than a
rich
man who is afflicted in body. Health and a good constitution are better than
any
amount of gold, and a strong body than untold riches. There is no greater
wealth
than health of body, and there is no greater happiness than gladness of
heart.
Death is better than a wretched life, and eternal rest than continual
sickness.
Good things spread out before a mouth that is closed are like piles of food
laid
on a grave. What good is an offering of fruit to an idol? It can neither eat
nor
smell. That is the way with a man who is afflicted by the Lord: He sees
things
with his eyes and groans, like a eunuch embracing a girl [groans]!" (In his
translation, Goodspeed omits the second "stenazon," or "groans," which is
present in the original.)
The analogy only works if the eunuch is nauseated by the female. A
castrated man
may not be able to "eat" (or can't he?), but he is in any case able to
"smell"
(please excuse the potential vulgarity). A eunuch, like a sick man, can do
neither.
Mark Brustman >>
___________________________________________________________________Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 12:43:25 -0800
From: "David D. Leitao" <dleitao@sfsu.edu>
Subject: laius citations
Here's a classicist's two cents on sources for the myth of Laius. I think
Andrei is right to suggest Sergent's book (cited below), but one should use
that book with great care. Sergent pays almost no attention to the
rhetorical context of his sources and is rather careless when it comes to
chronology (he does not, for instance, seem to care whether a source for a
homosexualized version of a myth comes from the 7th century BCE or the 4th
century CE--he treats them all as equal witnesses to a prehistoric Greek
institution of initiatory pederasty). But he has done his homework, and
the notes at the back of the book are generally very reliable: that is
where I would go to find good "scholarly citations" for the myth of Laius.
Graves' book on Greek myth is much more troubling. I don't think you will
find a classicist anywhere who puts much stock in his theories of myth
(which are imaginatively retailed in the notes to _The Greek Myths_ and in
"The White Goddess_). What is troubling are his citations to ancient
sources (which Rictor Norton has been kind enough to reproduce in an
earlier message): in my experience, I have found that as many of 50% of
the citations are faulty. Either they do not say what he claims that they
say or (more commonly) the actual passage is miscited (e.g., he might cite
Hyginus, Fabulae 120.2 where the actual passage is Hyg. Fab. 12.2). All of
this could have been avoided with some careful cite-checking on his part
(or his editor's part). So here too, as with the case of Sergent, the
citations (the 50% of the time that they are accurate) are more useful than
the interpretation.
David Leitao
>Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
>>Part of my work on the Androphile site consists of piecing together
>ancient homoerotic Greek (and other) myth. To that end I have found
>Bernard Sergeant's _Homosexuality in Greek Myth_ to be priceless. I
>have also used Donald Richardson's _Great Zeus and All His Children_,
>published by Greyden Press. The latter is a miserable printing, with
>no year of publication, and with absolutely no bibliography.
>>Is anyone familiar with Richardson and his work, particularly his
>sources and his reliability? Are there any other sources of
>homoerotic Greek myth in unexpurgated translation?
>>Thanks for any help,
>>Andrei
Prof. David D. Leitao
Assistant Professor
Department of Classics, College of Humanities
San Francisco State University
1600 Holloway Ave, San Francisco CA 94132
(415) 338-3071 (o), (650) 994-7330 (h)
dleitao@sfsu.edu
http://userwww.sfsu.edu/~dleitao/welcome.html
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 18:24:44 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gregory {Greg} Downing <gd2@is2.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: laius citations (and introduction)
Comment follows....
At 12:43 PM 4/4/99 -0800, David Leitao <dleitao@sfsu.edu> wrote:
>Graves' book on Greek myth is much more troubling. I don't think you will
>find a classicist anywhere who puts much stock in his theories of myth
>(which are imaginatively retailed in the notes to _The Greek Myths_ and in
>"The White Goddess_). What is troubling are his citations to ancient
>sources (which Rictor Norton has been kind enough to reproduce in an
>earlier message): in my experience, I have found that as many of 50% of
>the citations are faulty. Either they do not say what he claims that they
>say or (more commonly) the actual passage is miscited (e.g., he might cite
>Hyginus, Fabulae 120.2 where the actual passage is Hyg. Fab. 12.2). All of
>this could have been avoided with some careful cite-checking on his part
>(or his editor's part). So here too, as with the case of Sergent, the
>citations (the 50% of the time that they are accurate) are more useful than
>the interpretation.
>
Though I have not checked Graves and his references thoroughly, the several
times that I have used _The Greek Myths_ to try to find my way to the
original ancient sources for the myths he discusses I have had very similar
experiences to those you describe -- i.e., the references are "off".... Some
I eventually figured out (along the lines of 12.2 instead of 120.2). Some I
never *could* find.
I never introduced myself when I subscribed, as I think I was probably
supposed to do. I publish on Joyce, and centrally on the "Oxen of the Sun"
episode (episode 14) of _Ulysses_. "Oxen" takes place in the National
Maternity Hospital in Dublin; sexual and reproductive issues are thematized
and discussed. So that's why I'm on this list.
Greg Downing/NYU, at greg.downing@nyu.edu or gd2@is2.nyu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
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From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: laius citations
Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 22:17:39 +0100
I'm not certain I see the point of David Leitao's blanket warning to beware
the accuracy of Robert Graves's references. Either his citations for the
story about Laius's rape/abduction of Chrysippus are correct, or they
aren't. If they're not, then please correct them. I notice that the main
source cited by Graves -- Hyginus, _Fabulae_ 85 -- is also cited in
_Lempriere's Classical Dictionary_, though I also see that Graves cites
Apollodorus, iii. 5. 5 whereas Lempriere cites Apollodorus, 3. c. 5: perhaps
this is just a variation in the conventions used for citations or perhaps
this is indeed an example of a Graves typographical error. And I see that
where Graves cites Athenaeus xiii 79, J.A. Symonds in _A Problem in Greek
Ethics_ cites Athenaeus xiii 602. Another error? I don't know.
Does Leitao?
Incidentally, I accept that I am wrong about the Sacred Band of Thebes
consisting of 600 men. Though the phrase "300 pairs of lovers" is very
frequently used when talking about them, I understand it actually means "300
men consisting of lovers in pairs" (i.e. 300 in total, not 600).
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
-----Original Message-----
From: David D. Leitao <dleitao@sfsu.edu>
To: Histsex:For historians of sexuality <histsex@listbot.com>
Date: 04 April 1999 22:44
Subject: laius citations
<snip>
>Graves' book on Greek myth is much more troubling. I don't think you will
>find a classicist anywhere who puts much stock in his theories of myth
>(which are imaginatively retailed in the notes to _The Greek Myths_ and in
>"The White Goddess_). What is troubling are his citations to ancient
>sources (which Rictor Norton has been kind enough to reproduce in an
>earlier message): in my experience, I have found that as many of 50% of
>the citations are faulty. Either they do not say what he claims that they
>say or (more commonly) the actual passage is miscited (e.g., he might cite
>Hyginus, Fabulae 120.2 where the actual passage is Hyg. Fab. 12.2). All of
>this could have been avoided with some careful cite-checking on his part
>(or his editor's part). So here too, as with the case of Sergent, the
>citations (the 50% of the time that they are accurate) are more useful than
>the interpretation.
>
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Wed, 07 Apr 1999 19:45:15 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: construction, etc.
> Giovanni Dall'Orto is right to note that the late nineteenth-century
> psychiatric literature on homosexuality was preceded by the writings
> of activists like Benkert and Ulrichs. However, they themselves did
> not originate the ideas that a same-sex orientation was innate.
--David Greenberg
"Well that just reinforces the point, doesn't it, that these nineteenth
century scientists did not themselves "construct" homosexuality as an
innate characteristic?...
If writers going back to classical antiquity (which ones are meant?)
state that a same-sex orientation is innate, then doesn't that beg the
question of why so many historians today follow Foucault in insisting
that the homosexual identity was constructed by doctors in the last
century intent on controlling deviant behavior?
There was -- is -- something there in nature that all these witnesses
are trying to describe, however much they may have brought their own
societal, historical prejudices to bear."--Mark Brustman
Actually, I am not to sure that it does reinforce the point. Different
fields, such as homosexual rights activists and sexologists and nowadays
geneticists, do construct homosexuality, often (but not always) as an
innate characteristic. But this is not a property of the object being
constructed, but an interpretation of it offered by different discursive
fields. Its not like making a cathedral; once constructed it will stand
forever. Construction, here, refers specifically to the way that
different fields of discourse articulate an object in a way which is
_sui generis_ to their field. For example, anorexia nervosa can be
discursively constituted by psychoanalysts, feminists, doctors who are
into biochemistry, etc. These fields are all constructing the object in
their own way. They all make it exist in some sense, although they
never get the whole complexity of the object (ie, it is always
underdetermined) They also all have their own set of paradigmatic rules
of construction which are appropriate to members of the field, but will
not be suitable for other fields. However, just because someone else in
another field has spoken of an object, put forward a point, developed a
concept, or whatever, does not mean that the object is not also
constructed (or re-constructed, or simply imported in some way, but
probabaly not THE SAME way) by another field. Construction, in the
sense that this debate has taken, does not mean that 19th C medicine
invented homosexuality for the *first* time, as Giovanni Dall'Orto has
shown in his lucid emails. Rather, I think, that different strands of
medicine were constructing same sex desire in particular ways. These
ways can be sexology, venereology, fornesic medicine, psychiatry,
psychoanalysis, etc. Even these constructions are not themselves
equivalent. But they share a similar social position, to a greater or
lesser extent, unlike other fields like law or religion or 'homosexual
rights activists', etc, which of course occupy a different social space.
Construction, at the end, is the only means of speaking about the
world. There is no escaping it!
Cheerio,
Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 13:44:59 -0400 (EDT)
From: "David F. Greenberg" <dg4@is3.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
Ivan Crozier offers a standard social constructionist understanding of
discourses here in his remarks below. Most of these observations are
unexceptional, but I think they miss the point that Mark Brustman was
making. The discourses of late nineteenth-century psychiatry on same-sex
sexual attraction or activity were certainly not the same as those
employed in earlier periods of time. Hellenistic writers, and some writers
of the Italian Renaissance (e.g. Marsilio Ficino, Commentary on Plato's
Symposium on Love, speech 6, chapter 14), for example, explained same-sex
attraction astrologically; that is, as a result of the configuration of
the planetary bodies at the time. Innateness is configured differently
again the writings of contemporary genetic researchers like Dean Hamer.
But one need not be interested in discourses. Mark Brustman is simply
interested in the notion that over the ages, sexual interests were innate.
I don't doubt that he would concede that in different historical periods,
the detailed understanding of this innateness differed; that's simply not
his interest. Brustman goes on to suggest that "there is something in
nature that these witnesses are trying to describe." This is a strong
claim. The mere fact that notions of innateness appear and reappear at
various times doesn't make them true, any more than the recurrence of
claims for the existence of gods, ghosts or witches means that there is
anything corresponding to the words in discourses, or concepts in speech.
That's an entirely different question. Until very recently, the capacity
to determine what human traits are innate did not exist. There are a
limited number of ways available to explain human behavior and
inclinations. "Born that way" is one of them. I may be misreading
Crozier's remarks, but I construe (construct?) them to mean that one could
never determine whether the truth claims in a discourse are valid; in
other words, there are only verbal constructions or discourses, and the
constructions found in discourses are only representations unrelated to
the objects they purport to represent. If this is what Crozier means, it
seems to me to be altogether false. It is certainly true that some
representations correspond to nothing that exists in the world, but that
doesn't mean that this is true of all representations or discursive
fields. - David Greenberg, Sociology Department, New York University.
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 08 Apr 1999 15:05:14 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: construction and all that...
Thanks to Dr Greenberg for his comments on my email. I have a few
points which I think need to be addressed so as to state my position.
I completely agree that my observations were singularly unexceptional.
They have been commonplace to readers of Foucault for ages, and for
historians and sociologists of science as well (which is where I am
coming from). In this case my comment, which was directed primarily to
Dr Brustman's comment, "nineteenth century scientists did not themselves
"construct" homosexuality as an innate characteristic", should have no
effect at all. And it is for this reason that I wholly concur with
Greenberg when he writes, "The discourses of late nineteenth-century
psychiatry on same-sex sexual attraction or activity were certainly not
the same as those employed in earlier periods of time." How could they
be, if as I said all fields of discourse are in the business of
constructing discourses which are played out in such a way as to attempt
to establish an orthodox position on homosexuality (esp. when they are
making a knowledge claim, instead of a literary representation, but any
difference between these two things is another topic)? The best example
of this point, which Greenberg himslef wrote, was
"Hellenistic writers, and some writers of the Italian Renaissance (e.g.
Marsilio Ficino, Commentary on Plato's Symposium on Love, speech 6,
chapter 14), for example, explained same-sex attraction astrologically;
that is, as a result of the configuration of the planetary bodies at the
time. Innateness is configured differently again the writings of
contemporary genetic researchers like Dean Hamer."
What better example of the different constructions of innateness by
those commenting on homosexuality in history? I would have also added
Havelock Ellis, _Sexual Inversion_, John Addington Symonds, _A Problem
in Modern Ethics_, and a few other of my favourites. But, as historians
of sex recognise, there are other possible constructions of the same
object (homosexual desire), such as the acquired form constructed by
Schrenck-Notzing or by psychoanalysts, etc (I won't go on). My point
was that these are all constructions which are struggling for
legitimation and orthodoxy. Homosexual rights activists, sexologists,
forensic psychiatrists, etc, all are trying to establish the 'true' way
of interpreting homosexuality --the orthodoxy-- (although as Giovanni
Dall'Orto recently pointed out, this might especially be in countries
where there was no code Napoleon). This is why Dr Greenberg was not
misreading my remarks when he construed me to mean that "one could never
determine whether the truth claims in a discourse are valid; in other
words, there are only verbal constructions or discourses." I fully
agree. Unless one can get a God's eye view of how nature really is,
then one has to put up with discursive constructions of the world which
occasional produce the effects of the truth (in a sociological sense,
meaning that people believe them as if they were true, even though
epistemologists would have a great struggle with the same claims!--this
is why I am interested in the sociology of knowledge.)
This does not necessarily imply, however, that "the constructions found
in discourses are only representations unrelated to the objects they
purport to represent." (Greenberg) But the process of 'getting things
into discourse' is a difficult one, involving processes of articulation
-- it is a far more difficult issue than mere representation, although
the term will do in a lot of cases (but not really for facts about the
world). These articulations are done from the standpoint of one field
or other, and they are only ever going to be discursive in nature. They
are **not reality itself**, and they are not at all going to be correct
or incorrect in terms of 'the real world', but instead are going to be
judged by others making claims to the discursive construction of
reality. These others can be in the same field, or in a different field
altogether.
Such a view may be considered false by some. It has been said of my
email that "some representations correspond to nothing that exists in
the world, but that doesn't mean that this is true of all
representations or discursive fields." This, I believe, is the false
position. All constructions of the world or of reality, regardless if
they are of homosexual desires, quarks, microbes, genes, etc, are just
discursive constructions. There is a reality there somewhere, but it is
not in a discursive represenation which is about the thing itself. With
this a number of sociologists of knowledge, anthropologists, and
epistemologists will agree. The implication: we have to live with
discursive constructions. An unexceptional, and even stodgy old idea
(Wittgenstein, Bachelard, Kuhn and Canguilhem all were there years ago).
After all of this, however, I perhaps am on Dr Greenberg's 'side'? We
are both critical of Dr Brustman's claim that "there is something in
nature that these witnesses are trying to describe."
Dr Greenberg goes on to say that "This is a strong claim. The mere fact
that notions of innateness appear and reappear at various times doesn't
make them true, any more than the recurrence of claims for the existence
of gods [mean that the existence of gods are true]". This being the
case, is Dr Greenberg suggesting that some constructions of things (eg,
ghosts) are not true, whereas innateness is? I do not think so. If so,
then it is a strong claim. If not, then why am I writing this email in
response to a position which is almost the same as my own?
Cheers, Ivan
Ivan crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 22:26:51 +0100
I think that Ivan Crozier misconstrued (misconstructed ?) the points that
Mark Brustman (and Giovanni dall'Orto) were making, and I'm glad David
Greenberg has clarified the issue by focusing on the central issue.
I quite agree that "one need not be interested in discourses". It is
entirely possible to discover, understand and experience objective reality
without the means of linguistic discourse (e.g. by using chemical analysis),
and in particular without using
discourse in its Foucauldian sense (i.e. an ideological set of paradigms
designed to extend and control the power of the bourgeoisie -- a meaning of
"discourse" that Ivan Crozier does not seem to realize is the ground for
most social constructionist talk about "discourse").
But to get to the point. I agree with Brustman that "there is something in
nature that these witnesses are trying to describe". And I think that the
history of homosexuality does suggest the existence of something innate in a
class of persons whom today we would call gay or lesbian or queer. Here are
a baker's half-dozen reasons why:
1. Whenever this class of persons is discussed (as sodomites or whatever),
in a very wide range of cultures and over a wide range of historical
periods, the predominant conclusion is that they embody an innate sexual
orientation, they were born that way, etc., as Greenberg mentions. This is
not conclusive, but it is suggestive. Either it reflects a widespread
perception of reality, or it is a mass delusion. (The fact that people
account for this innateness in different ways, including astrology, is, as
Greenberg says, irrelevant as far as this point is concerned. That simply
means that they use different tools (often inadequate by modern standards)
to explain what may be a relatively unitary objective reality.)
2. Although social constructionists rhetorically claim an "infinite variety"
of ways of being homosexual or ways of conceiving of homosexual classes of
person, that is not true: there are maybe four or five basic ways of being
homosexual throughout history and across cultures. You're not to get many
more even by using very fine points of discrimination. If homosexuality were
not innate, one would expect to find far more varieties of homosexualities
than in fact one can find.
3. Sexual excitement has physiological symptoms which seem to be beyond
rational control (in animals and in humans), and intense sexual desire often
provokes a chain reaction of behaviour that it is not entirely unreasonable
to call "instinctual", and which seems to be linked to various congenital or
biological or genetic patterns that may have developed several millennia
ago. That is, it is not unreasonable to suggest that both homosexual desire
and heterosexual desire are innate.
4. There is a great deal of evidence in twentieth-century records -- medical
and legal and historical -- to suggest that significant modification of
behaviour related to sexual orientation is nearly impossible to achieve.
This is true even though so many disadvantages accrue to being homosexual --
many really serious disadvantages for most of history. If sexual orientation
is mainly acquired rather than innate, it is odd that it is so difficult to
change it. Retraining for a new sexuality, unlike retraining for a new job,
usually ends in failure.
Finally, three reasons given by Ray Evans in a 1961 article in ONE Institute
Quarterly of Homophile Studies, which I do not think have been undermined by
advances in the past 35 years:
5. "the very fact that throughout the mammalian scale, a great many more
males than females engage in homosexual behavior is in itself suggestive of
a constitutional factor".
6. "Despite innumerable case histories and expansive psychoanalytic
"explanations", there is no incontrovertible evidence as to how
homosexuality is acquired through life experiences. There is no known set of
conditions which invariably leads to its development".
7. "When virtually all pressures and attitudes of parents and society tend
to teach and enforce heterosexual behavior, it is perplexing how anyone
learns to be homosexual."
The question of the innateness or congenitality of sexual orientation is not
itself an issue that historicans can definitively answer: it may well be an
issue that only geneticists and biologists can answer. In that sense it is
an issue that is "beyond history", and frankly it's not the most interesting
issue in the history of sexuality. It is nevertheless an issue the historian
of sexualty has to address, for it may affect the "weighting" that we give
to certain kinds of evidence or theory. My own position is simply that
sexual culture (which is the more interesting subject to me) is *grounded
upon innate sexuality*. I frankly think that this premise is more productive
than trying to account for sexuality itself in purely cultural terms, or
even in primarily cultural terms. The attempt to find a cultural "cause" of
something as fundamental as sexual orientation (though SC theorists deny
that this is "fundamental") has led to some overstrained notions, for
example, about the relation of capitalism and homosexuality, a common theme
of the social constructionist approach, which incidentally tends to be less
truly historical than the essentialist approach, for it so often gets locked
into accounting for everything in terms of the bourgeois discourses
constructed in the late nineteenth century.
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Wed, 07 Apr 1999 22:48:04 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Conferences?
Hi all. I have been promoting the idea that the "construction" of
eunuchs in the ancient world matches the modern "construction" of
homosexuality in most of its key elements, so that when reading ancient
texts, such as the Bible, the eunuchs mentioned therein can be
interpreted as analogous to or even identified with today's homosexual
men.
The key finding of my research is that under Roman law (and in other
ancient texts), eunuchs were defined as potentially procreating, of
which somebody should inform the people who compile the Oxford English
Dictionary, at the very least.
My question now is: As I am not in the academic profession, can any of
those who are in this field say what conferences I should apply to so I
might make a presentation of my research in this area?
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 11:58:48 +0100
By way of a postscript to my earlier remarks on innate homosexuality,
I just want to address David Greenberg's reference to Ficino and the
discourse of astrology used to illustrate innateness. Greenberg says:
"Hellenistic writers, and some writers of the Italian Renaissance (e.g.
Marsilio Ficino, Commentary on Plato's Symposium on Love, speech 6,
chapter 14), for example, explained same-sex attraction astrologically;
that is, as a result of the configuration of the planetary bodies at
the time." This is strictly correct, but it is a shorthand summary that
may give a wrong impression about the importance of astrological discourse,
particularly in the case of Marsilio Ficino (1433-99).
Ficino's letters addressed to the young and handsome Giovanni
Cavalcanti (1444-1509) are nothing less than ardent love letters. After
Ficino's death his biographers tried to rebut the rumours that he and
Cavalcanti were lovers, and his follower Benedetto Varchi was openly
accused of being a sodomite. Ficino in one letter acknowledged that one
can have "too great a love for the body, [but] that is not strange
either, since the body is the companion and child of the soul." It is
worth remarking that Ficino loved his pupil Cavalcanti (the son of a
nobleman) from a very early age, and they lived together for many years
at the villa at Careggio, where he supervised his Platonic Academy.
Most of Ficino's works were written with Giovanni at his side, solacing
him during periods of black melancholy, and his most important work _De
Amore_ is dedicated to his protege. In this commentary on Plato's
Symposium, members of Ficino's Academy read aloud and analyze the
speeches of Plato's characters; Cavalcanti took the speeches of
Phaedrus, the archetypal beloved in the canon of _amor Socraticus_.
It is quite true that Ficino was a student of Hermetic mysticism and
astrology (and a singer of Orphic hymns) and that he used this
discourse to explain that lover and beloved are transformed into one
another: he who gives himself unreservedly to his beloved ceases to be
himself and becomes his beloved. Several of Ficino's works have what we
would consider to be a very odd reverence for Jupiter within a
Christian context. In one letter to Cavalcanti he says:
"It is said that the ancient theologians, whose memory we
revere, entered into sacred bonds of love and friendship
with one another. Among the Persians it is said that
Zoroaster, under the divine mystery of religious
philosophy, chose Arimaspis as his companion. Hermes
Trismegistus among the Egyptians similarly chose
Aesculapius. In Thrace Orpheus chose Museus as his
companion, and for such a union Pythagorus chose
Aglaophemus as his companion. Plato in Athens first chose
Dion of Syracuse, and after his death Xenocrates was
dearest to him. Thus wise men have always felt it necessary
to have God as their guide, with a man as their companion
on their journey. Although I am not confident that I can
follow in the footsteps of such men in their heavenly
journey, there is nevertheless one thing I have acquired in
full measure from the study of sacred philosophy, virtue
and truth: the joyful company of the man most dear to me.
For I think that the friendship of Giovan Cavalcanti and
Marsilio Ficino as worthy of being numbered among those I
have just named, and I do not doubt but that, with the
guidance of God, who has so happily established and
quickened our bond, this friendship will provide everything
necessary to us for a life of tranquility and our
investigation of the divine."
Ficino also used Christian symbolism to legitimate Socratic love: for
example, a celebration of the holy day of the pair-bond of St James and
St Christopher (cf. Boswell):
"Yesterday at Novola we celebrated the holy day of St James
and St Christopher - I would have called it a feast rather
than just holy if you had been there: but without you there
was no feast for me. See how dear you are to your Marsilio,
who cares not (if one dare say so) even for heavenly things
without you. That is appropriate, for he who has joined
together St James and St Christopher in a single solemn
festival has similarly united Marsilio and Giovanni in
life. And the same spirit, or a similar genius, guides us
both. I believe that God has ordained that we share one
will and the same habits here upon earth, and that in
heaven we shall live under the same rule, and with the same
marks of happiness."
The point I want to make is that these examples suggest that Ficino
could be said to have exploited a variety of discourses (Neoplatonic
and Christian) in order to legitimate the love he had for Cavalcanti.
Ficino practically acknowledges that these discourses are mere tools
rather than beliefs when when he says that he "cares not (if one dare
say so) even for heavenly things without you." His basically
inexplicable love was the objective ground upon which different
intellectual superstructures were placed in order to increase its
valuation and in order to comprehend it. And, it must be said, these
superstructures are often mere subterfuges: as reviewed in Giovanni
Dall'Orto's excellent article on "`Socratic Love' as a Disguise for
Same-sex Love in the Italian Renaissance," _Journal of Homosexuality_,
16 (1988), pp. 33-65.
The social constructionist will typically focus upon these
superstructures (constructs) and get into some rather arid discussions
about Neoplatonic homoerotics; whereas the essentialist will focus upon
the fundamental matter here, which is Marsilio Ficino's love for
Giovanni Cavalcanti. The social constructionist will claim that the
discourse determines the experience; the essentialist will say that the
experience determines the discourse. The social constructionist will
typically address the theory; the essentialist will typically address
the reality. I think that the essentialist "bottom-up" view of influence, as
seen in this short history of Ficino's constructs, tends to reflect the
state of affairs more accurately than the social constructionist "top-down"
view of influence; and insofar as this is the case, tends to suggest (though
not prove) innateness.
Ficino in his translation of Plato's _Phaedrus_ is responsible for
coining the term "platonic love", meaning love between men (in a
patron/protege relationship), striving for virtue but allowing for
physical love (as does Plato's _Phaedrus_). "Platonic love" combines
Neoplatonic and Christian ideals with images and phrases from Provencal
and Tuscan love lyrics, and is deeply romantic. Barely a generation
after Ficino's death, his concept of "amore Platonico" was split up
into two opposing concepts: the original male/male relationship, now
more likely to be called "amor Socraticus", was treated by nearly
everyone as a euphemism for sodomy (and remains the basis for much
homosexual discourse); and most of the positive elements of the concept
were transferred to male/female relations, under the term "courtly
love" (and remain the basis for much heterosexual discourse). Several
books were written at this time (e.g. Castiglione's _The Courtier_, 1528)
containing passages from Plato's works that were rewritten substituting
female pronouns for male pronouns so as to suppress their original
male/male content. Many of the features of Platonic love grew out of
male/male relations and no longer functioned in this new male/female
context (e.g. pedagogy; military honour), but they were simply glossed over
or ignored or re-designed without regard to the logic of the original. It's
an important watershed (though I don't know that I would call it a
paradigmatic shift) in sexual history, after which heterosexual history
became mainstream and homosexual history became marginalized.
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 09 Apr 1999 20:17:44 +1200
From: sara <sara@meridian.net.nz>
Subject: research on rape
My name is Sara Taylor. I am a masters student at the University of
Auckland in New Zealand, enrolled for a masters degree in the department
of Psychology. I am conducting my research on women's experience of
therapy for rape.
I am wishing to engage in email conversation with women who have been
raped and have been through or are in the process of undergoing therapy
for the experience of rape.
If you feel that you may be interested in participating or would like
more information about this research please email me
sara@meridian.com.nz.
Thank you for you time and interest.
Yours sincerely,
Sara Taylor
My supervisor is:
Dr Nicola Gavey
Department of Psychology
The University of Auckland
Private Bag 90219
Auckland
New Zealand
Tel. 373-7999 extn. 6877
The Head of Department is:
Professor Graham Vaughn
Department of Psychology
The University of Auckland
Private Bag 90219
Auckland
New Zealand
Tel. 9 373-7999 extn. 8555
For any queries regarding ethical concerns please contact:
Dr Dennis Moore,
Chair, The University of Auckland Human Subjects Ethics Committee,
The University of Auckland, C/o Research Office, Private Bag 90219,
Auckland. Tel. 373-7999 extn. 8939
APPROVED BY THE AUCKLAND HUMAN SUBJECTS ETHICS COMMITTEE
on 19 August, 1998 for a period of 2 year, from 19/08/1998
Reference 1998/179
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 03:46:23 -0500
From: Bob <suannschafer@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
>... I think that the
>history of homosexuality does suggest the existence of something innate ....
>>1. Whenever this class of persons is discussed (as sodomites or whatever)
>... the predominant >conclusion is that they embody an innate sexual
>orientation, they were born that way, etc., ....
I appreciate what I take to be your example of Ficino in a later posting,
but I'm wondering if other examples can be found in your book, _The Myth of
the Modern Homosexual_?
And I'm wondering if you think "innateness" is a construct -- the meaning
of which is consequently contextually determined.
>2. ... there are maybe four or five basic ways of being
>homosexual.... If homosexuality were
>not innate, one would expect to find far more varieties of homosexualities
>than in fact one can find.
And I'm wondering if "being homosexual" is indeed necessarily "innateness."
>3. ... intense sexual desire often
>provokes a chain reaction of behaviour that it is not entirely unreasonable
>to call "instinctual" ....
And is this necessarily "innateness"?
>5. "the very fact that throughout the mammalian scale, a great many more
>males than females engage in homosexual behavior is in itself suggestive of
>a constitutional factor".
And is "a constitutional factor" necessarily the same as "innateness"?
>6. "Despite innumerable case histories and expansive psychoanalytic
>"explanations", there is no incontrovertible evidence as to how
>homosexuality is acquired through life experiences. There is no known set of
>conditions which invariably leads to its development".
And is the converse necessarily "innateness"?
>The question of the innateness or congenitality
Is "innateness" necessarily "congenitality"?
>of sexual orientation ....
>My own position is simply that
>sexual culture (which is the more interesting subject to me) is *grounded
>upon innate sexuality*.
And of course doesn't the above depend on how one defines "sexual culture,"
indeed "sex" itself, the latter a query someone raised on this list about a
week ago?
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 09 Apr 1999 15:15:40 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
In 03.46 09/04/99 -0500, a "Bob" wrote to Rictor Norton:
>I appreciate what I take to be your example of Ficino in a later posting,
>but I'm wondering if other examples can be found in your book, _The Myth of
>the Modern Homosexual_?
Norton will of course answer for his own book.
As for your question in general, however, there are scores of examples from
ancient sources attributing same-sex behaviours to a personal preference.
(By the way, I would not use the word "innate", because the ancients did
not use it, as far as I know: they often used, on the other hand, another
term: "inclinatio", which is by the way also an astrological term).
Just think of Jacques de Vitry's complaint (In: _Historia occidentalis et
orientalis_) that in XIII century Paris prostitutes in the roads yelled
"Sodomite!" after students who had refused their sollicitation: ("Quod si
forte ingredi recusarent, confestim eos sodomitas post ipsos conclamantes
dicebant"). If we were to believe to Social Constructionist dogma,
sodomites were "single-act sinners" (Foucault dixit), and this anecdote
would make no sense at all: a man refused to have intercourse with a woman,
then the women accused him of... liking anal intercourse... as if it were
something that cannot be performed with women as well.
Of course Social Constuctionism is, as usual, wrong, and Paris prostitutes
were just conceptualising just as we do in terms of a dychotomy: i.e. males
who _only_ love males versus males who love women.
Another amusing example is the one in pseudo-Artistoteles' "Problemata",
puzzled by the fact that some men prefer to be anally penetrated by other
men. It gives a *physical* explanation to the riddle (they have their
pleasure "nerves" - whatever they might have been - ending in the anus
instead than in their genitalia!). Would Bob call this situation "innate"
or not?
Aquinas (Summa theologica, I, ii, quaestio 31, art. 7) discussed this
theory, believing it to be a genuine one by Aristoteles. He objected that
some acts which are against nature might in fact take place according with
a particular person's nature, but this must be a sick nature (such as the
man with rabies who hates water), therefore they are against nature anyway.
Which shows that it is purely false that our ancestors, including Aquinas,
were not capable of conceptualising same-sex acts as stemming from an
"inclinatio": they simply did not _want_ to do it. Quite as the Christians
are doing now. This is a *political* decision, not a gnoseological one.
The fact that sodomy was not strictly meant as "anal intercourse" is shown
in scores of documents (even amusing ones, such as a complaint that
"nowadays" priests who do not have a concubine are assumed to be
sodomites...), some of which amazing: e.g. Jean Gerson in his
_Confessionel_ says that if a man confesses masturbation, the confessor
should ask about his fantasies, because if he fantasised about a married
woman, then his act must be dealt with as adultery, if he fantasised about
a man, then this is sodomy... and so on.
One XVII century treatises says that a man having intercourse with a woman
fantasizing about a man is a sodomite anyway.
And the "Visitaçao" of Inquisition in Bahia, Brasil, at the end of XVI
century, has an incredible statement by the Inquisitor towards a woman who
confessed same-sex acts with a woman: "Esta torpeza entre molheres é
sodomia": "This filthiness between women is sodomy".
Somebody must explain to me how this statemenmt could be translated as
"anal sex", as Social Constructionist dogmas would put it. "Sodomia" here
clearly means not "anal sex", but "sexual acts between persons of the same
sex", which is what "homosexuality" (also) means today. So, what the
construction was assumed to be, please?
Yet until now all of these documents have been swept away in contempt
without ever being taken into consideration and/or discussed by prevailing
dogmas. Since there could be no homosexuality before 1869, then they cannot
deal with homosexuality. And since they don't deal with a thing called
homosexuality, then it is proved that no such a thing as homosexuality
existed before 1869. And so on.
In philosophy this circular way of reasoing is called "petitio principii".
The point I (and not only me, of course) make is that nobody ever
demonstrated that a medical construction of homosexuality occurred in the
first place.
Just picking up what doctors said in XIX century does not demonstrate they
had the lead. They were just one among several social groups who were
making their very own "discourses" about same-sex sex. Yet discourses were
made also by philosophers, lawyers, thologists, politicians,
HOMOSEXUAL/URANIAN/THIRD SEX ACTIVISTS... and many more!
Therefore before positing a "social construction" based on what doctors had
to say, one has to demonstate that any other discourse except the medical
one was not relevant at all. Which Social contructionists not only never
achieved, but never tried to.
This said, I would not buy Norton's eagerness in calling himself an
"essentialist", as he does in the book of his Bob mentions. Essentialism is
a straw man, invented by Constructionists to have a token enemy and an
anathema word to be used against anyone disagreeing with their religion. I
can't find anything interesting in an "essentialist" point of view.
Constructionsts imply that since tehre were no gay saunas in XIII centruy
Paris, then there was no homosexuality. Essentialists à la Boswell say
there were "gay people" (!!!) then they proceed and find out gay saunas in
XIII Paris! As if life should always comply with the models Anglosaxon
homosexuals best like and as if reality should be rated accordingly.
What both sides do is (falsely) implying that homosexuality, to have the
right to be so defined, must comply, EVERYWHERE AND ALWAYS, to the
Anglo-saxon social model of today.
Here is where the true "social construction" lies (in both meanings :) ):
in the assumption that such a thing such as a "modern homosexual" ever
existed. Which is false.
I agree with Bob, anyway, that the conception of "innatedness" is socially
constructed. Quite as the words "to agree", "conception", "social" and
"construction" are all socially constructed.
In fact, nothing we can discuss about can be but socially constructed. The
very language we use to talk is.
My point is: given this obvious and self-evident fact, why has sex or worse
homosexuality alone to stand alone to be "deconstructed"?
There is an answer I have been waiting to get for 15 years.
Any answers, anyone?
Best wishes.
Giovanni Dall'Orto (Milano - Italy)
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 11:59:25 -0500
From: Bob <suannschafer@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
>... there are scores of examples from
>ancient sources attributing same-sex behaviours to a personal preference.
>(By the way, I would not use the word "innate", because the ancients did
>not use it, as far as I know: they often used, on the other hand, another
>term: "inclinatio"....
Okay, as a non-scholar of Latin, can I assume inclinatio "becomes" the
English "incline."
And so I would agree that I would also not use the word "innate"
And this was the issue I had with some of Rictor Norton's points. I hardly
think "inclined" is the same as "innate" -- and therefore I think one must
be careful in how one interprets -- historically, contextually -- examples
-- as "evidence."
>Another amusing example is the one in pseudo-Artistoteles' "Problemata",
>puzzled by the fact that some men prefer to be anally penetrated ....
>Would Bob call this situation >"innate"or not?
I don't think so -- it's "preference."
>Aquinas (Summa theologica, I, ii, quaestio 31, art. 7) discussed this
>theory, believing it to be a genuine one by Aristoteles. He objected that
>some acts which are against nature
Of course further explanation is required as to how anal penetration is
"against nature."
> ... our ancestors, including Aquinas,
>were not capable of conceptualising same-sex acts as stemming from an
>"inclinatio": they simply did not _want_ to do it.
And I don't think this is at all "innate."
>"sexual acts between persons of the same
>sex" ... is what "homosexuality" (also) means today.
But "homosexuality" also mean other things today.
>Since there could be no homosexuality before 1869, then they cannot
>deal with homosexuality. And since they don't deal with a thing called
>homosexuality, then it is proved that no such a thing as homosexuality
>existed before 1869. And so on.
>In philosophy this circular way of reasoing is called "petitio principii".
And of course this depends on what one means by "homosexuality." Just
because one before 1869 did not have -- for lack of a better term -- a
"blanket term" for homosexuality, does not of course mean there wasn't
sexuality. One didn't have a term for DNA at the same time, but of course
DNA has always existed.
>The point I (and not only me, of course) make is that nobody ever
>demonstrated that a medical construction of homosexuality occurred in the
>first place.
I am confused as to the insistence on a "medical" construction of homosex.
>... discourses were
>made also by philosophers ...
>Therefore before positing a "social construction" based on what doctors had
>to say, one has to demonstate that any other discourse except the medical
>one was not relevant at all.
I agree.
> I
>can't find anything interesting in an "essentialist" point of view.
Why?
>Constructionsts imply that since tehre were no gay saunas in XIII centruy
>Paris, then there was no homosexuality.
How do we "know" there weren't? Perhaps not saunas, perhaps not what we
would call "gay bathhouses," but perhaps same-sex activities occurred in
the 13th century bathhouses of Paris and elsewhere?
>As if life should always comply with the models Anglosaxon
>homosexuals best like and as if reality should be rated accordingly.
THANK YOU :)
>What both sides do is (falsely) implying that homosexuality, to have the
>right to be so defined, must comply, EVERYWHERE AND ALWAYS, to the
>Anglo-saxon social model of today.
I agree.
>the words "to agree", "conception", "social" and
>"construction" are all socially constructed.
Precisely.
>In fact, nothing we can discuss about can be but socially constructed. The
>very language we use to talk is.
And yet as another list of which I am a member insists, there is (some)
underlying "reality" to the social constructions formulated by langue.
>My point is: given this obvious and self-evident fact, why has sex or worse
>homosexuality alone to stand alone to be "deconstructed"?
Why, because we're uncomfortable talking about sex. Witness the president
of the USA.
>There is an answer I have been waiting to get for 15 years.
I'm not sure that's an answer that will satisfy anyone.
>Giovanni Dall'Orto (Milano - Italy)
E come va le cose a Milano?
Bob
___________________________________________________________________
From: The Fawcett Library <fawcett@lgu.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 16:26:33 +0100 (British Summer Time)
Discussion of "essentialism" reminds me of the old feminist
saw:
I believe in difference.
You tend towards essentialism.
She is a biological determinist.
('Scuse frivolity).
David Doughan, Reference Librarian
The Fawcett Library (The National Library of Women)
fawcett@lgu.ac.uk
http://www.lgu.ac.uk/fawcett/main.htm
Phone: 0171 320 1189
Fax: 0171 320 1188
_________________
"If a woman has to choose between catching
a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will
choose to save the infant without even considering
whether there's a man on base." [attrib. to Dave Barry]
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: construction, etc.
Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 17:30:53 +0100
I know that objections can be raised to the various arguments I recently put
forth in support of "innateness", but I don't understand the nature of Bob's
apparent objection to my use of the word "innate". All I mean by "innate" is
its commonly accepted meaning: "inborn, natural", as distinguished from
"acquired, cultural". The other words that I used -- "instinctual",
"congenital", "constitutional" -- , as they are usually understood, are
pretty well synonymous with the usual meaning of "innate". So I don't see a
linguistic problem here, though perhaps I am missing Bob's point.
Innateness itself is not a construct "the meaning of which is consequently
contextually determined" -- it's simply a word with a commonly understood
meaning that can be looked up in any dictionary: at least the way I'm using
it!
But I do appreciate the argument that *the belief that one's sexual
orientation is innate* could be a construct (e.g. drummed into one from an
early age, and therefore "internalised"). However, many of the examples I
cite are not related to *beliefs*: they are related to measurable
physiological patterns of behaviour etc. which suggest (though they do not
prove) the primacy of innate factors. There might be a variety of reasons
for my *belief*, for example, that my sexual orientation is genetically
predisposed, and people could psychoanalyse me or analyse my political
ideology and treat this *belief* as a "construct". But whether or not my
sexual orientation *really is* genetically predisposed can be tested and
evaluated according to scientific procedures. In this context, I was
interested to see a posting last month from Dean Hamer -- whose famous Xq28
finding gave rise to the journalistic term "gay gene", shorthand for an
exceedingly complex finding -- that "new data from an independent research
group at NIMH and University of Chicago has replicated the linkage between
Xq28 DNA markers and male sexual orientation." Whether or not this finding
is correct, and exactly *how much* influence genes have on orientation, I
don't know. But I don't think that this research can be evaluated by
treating it as either a "construct" or a "discourse".
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 09 Apr 1999 18:29:51 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: Re: Desire and identity
In 14.45 01/04/99 +0000, hai scritto:
who said eunuchs were considered in ancient times as lacking sexual desire?
The lusty enunuch does appear in satyrists. He would like to, but he cannot.
THEY found it very amusing...
Furthermore "galli", self castrated priests for Syrian cults, were always
portraied as very effeminate, and sometimes also as seized by lust (for
men) that, as passive partenrs, they could at least satisfy.
Giovanni Dall'Orto
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 09 Apr 1999 14:51:06 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Re: Desire and identity
Well, a couple of famous Christians at least said eunuchs lacked sexual
desire, Clement of Alexandria ("the eunuch is really not unable, but unwilling
to have sex" Paedagogus III 4.25) and Jerome ("born eunuchs are those of a
colder nature, who do not seek lust" Comm. in Matth. 19.12). Of course, these
were Christians who believed that sex was only to be used within marriage for
procreative purposes, so they would not have needed to be very specific that
eunuchs' lack of desire was for sex with _women_.
I myself did not mean to say -- if I really did -- that eunuchs were lacking
in sexual desire for men. I meant that if a man lacked sexual desire for
women, he could be called a eunuch.
Clement also quoted the Basilidians as saying that born eunuchs are "men who
from their birth have a natural sense of revulsion from a woman, and men who
are naturally so constituted do better not to marry" (Stromata III 1.1).
You are correct that Martial (Epigrams XI 81) tells a joke about an old man
and a eunuch trying to have a three-way with a female, and neither being able
to do it. The frustrated woman is left praying to Aphrodite to make the old
man a youth and the eunuch a male. But this is a fairly isolated instance in
literature and seems to be a ridicule of frustrated female lust due to male
impotence. Or it could be just an anti-eunuch joke: "An old man and a homo
walk into a bar, and..."
Martial (Epigrams III 81) also ridicules the case of a man who does like
women, who has himself castrated so he can be a eunuch priest. Martial's
ridicule shows that he expects eunuchs to have no desire for women:
What is a woman's chasm to you, Baeticus Gallus?
This tongue is supposed to lick undecided men.
For what reason was your dick cut off by Samia with a potsherd
If the pussy was so satisfying to you, Baeticus?
Your head should be castrated, for though you are accepted for a priest
because of your groin,
You still deceive the sanctuary of Cybele: in the mouth you are a male.
There are numerous other instances in which a "eunuch" is said to be impotent,
and numerous other instances in other languages in which a lack of desire for
sex with women is said to be innate.
I think the problem is that we are unable to see homosexuality (the innate
characteristic) the way the ancient people and people from other cultural
traditions saw (see) it, because our cultural views have changed, not because
it did not exist then or does not exist now.
You are from Italy, and as you note your situation there is different from
that of Anglo-Saxon cultures. Several years ago, at the age of nineteen, I was
approached by an old man in the park in Padova and we started talking about
gay life. I asked him what the Italian word for gay was. He said there was no
such word, only: "un uomo che dorme con un altro uomo." He said that 96% of
Italian men "were that."
In such a context, which is very different from the Anglo-Saxon context, it is
not the man who likes sex with other men who stands out. It is the man who
likes the insertee role who stands out. In ancient Rome and Greece, such a man
would be called a eunuch, and might very well be considered lascivious and
lustful, but only with men.
In Anglo-Saxia, any man who is discovered to have had sex with a man, no
matter what role if any he adopts, is often considered a deviant by nature.
Which is why in Anglo-Saxia, some scholars try so hard to prove there is no
such thing as "nature" in sexuality.
Mark
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 09 Apr 1999 15:58:34 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Correction!
Please excuse me, I was in a hurry and misspoke when I said a man who likes the
insertee role would be called a eunuch in ancient Greece and Rome. He would
probably be called a cinaedus. A eunuch is, as I have said repeatedly, a man who
lacks desire for women. Being a cinaedus and being a eunuch, however, often
occurred in conjunction.
Mark
aquarius@well.com schrieb:
> In such a context, which is very different from the Anglo-Saxon context, it is
> not the man who likes sex with other men who stands out. It is the man who
> likes the insertee role who stands out. In ancient Rome and Greece, such a man
> would be called a eunuch, and might very well be considered lascivious and
> lustful, but only with men.
>
___________________________________________________________________
From: SusanDara@aol.com
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 09:38:10 EDT
Subject: Question of Masculinity
Hello all.
I want to assign something to my undergrade class on the construction of
masculinity in the Victorian World and I am having the hardest time doing so.
The problem is that there is not enough time to have them read a book length
work. What had wanted was one or two chapters from a work or an article. I
am planing on tieing this into Jane Eyre, The Wide Sargasso Sea, and, if it
is approaved, excerpts from some period erotica in order show how men's
concept of malness in this era directly affected their power of
interrelationship with women, society, family, and their sexual drives.
I hope that this is withing the scope of our list, if not I appoligize for
posting this.
Susan
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Lesley Hall" <lesleyah@primex.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Question of Masculinity
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 15:28:26 +0100
Susan Dara wrote:
>I want to assign something to my undergrade class on the construction of
>masculinity in the Victorian World and I am having the hardest time doing
so.
> The problem is that there is not enough time to have them read a book
length
>work. What had wanted was one or two chapters from a work or an article.
There is a good article by John Tosh in History Workshop (though I don't
have an exact ref for this to hand - at a guess 1997) on Victorian
constructions of masculinity (mainly middle-class as I recall) and some
useful articles in his edited collection with Mike Roper _Manful Assertions_
(1991).
On the specific construction of man as sexual being and the resultant
anxieties in the Victorian era, I might venture to suggest chapter one of my
own _Hidden Anxieties: male sexuality 1900-1950_ (1991)!
Lesley Hall
lesleyah@primex.co.uk
___________________________________________________________________ From: "Lesley Hall" <lesleyah@primex.co.uk>
Subject: Fw: (Reumann) Question of Masculinity
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 23:05:14 +0100
From: Reumann@aol.com <Reumann@aol.com>
Date: 10 April 1999 16:57
Susan Dara -
A good work on the construction of Victorian masculinity is Lenore
Davidoff, "Class and Gender in Victorian England: The Diaries of Arthur J.
Munby and Hannah Cullwick," which appeared in _Feminist Studies_ vol. 5
(Spring, 1979). Munby was a middle-class bachelor who had an elaborate and
long-term sexual relationship with his servant Hannah Cullwick, a
relationship which revolved around his conflicted attraction to
working-class
women. As I recall, the author examined the diaries of both Munby and
Cullwick along with photographic evidence, and analyzed their relationship
in
the context of broader patterns of mid-Victorian sexual culture. I read
this
as an undergrad more than 10 years ago, and the fact that I remembered
enough
detail to find the reference attests to how compelling a read it was.
Miriam Reumann
Visiting Scholar, Brown University
Dept. of American Civilization
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 16:09:44 +0100
From: Ianthe <ianthe@duende.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Question of Masculinity
In message <31257001.2440ae42@aol.com>, SusanDara@aol.com writes
>Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
>>Hello all.
>>I want to assign something to my undergrade class on the construction of
>masculinity in the Victorian World and I am having the hardest time doing so.
> The problem is that there is not enough time to have them read a book length
>work. What had wanted was one or two chapters from a work or an article.
Possible items, with a focus on youth and masturbation,
which might be a tittilating enough topic to drag them
away from the tv and graphic novels... :)
Hendrick, Harry. Images of Youth - Age, Class, and
the Male Youth Problem, 1880-1920.
Hare, E.H.
Masturbatory Insanity - the history of an idea.
JOURNAL OF MENTAL SCIENCE, Vol. 108. pp. 1-25.
Nelson, Claudia B.
Sex and the Single Boy - ideals of manliness and sexuality in
Victorian literature for boys.
VICTORIAN STUDIES, Vol.32, No.4, 1989. pp. 525-550.
There's also a good Masculinity and Imperialism Bibliography
by pahonen@sol.uvic.ca which is up on the web somewhere.
An AltaVista search on the e-mail address should bring
it up.
--
Ianthe
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 09:57:03 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
The unsolvable debate about essentialism and constructivism has, I
think, been manifest once again in its usual form. And it is patently
clear that this is not a case of some not understanding others, but that
there are two incommensurable approaches to something like homosexuality
(or any other thing, for that matter). There are those who are
concerned with its existence in reality, and there are those who think
that reality exists, but that any knowledge about it is constructed by
different groups of people at different times. As an historian and
sociologist of science, I am interested to see that the kinds of debates
which took place amongst positivist philosphers of science and
post-Kuhnian sociologists of science (and later with the sociologists
and scientists themselves) are raging on this list too!
Basically, to restate the point, there are those who think that reality
speaks for itself (essentialists, although I too thought--like Giovanni
Dall'Orto--that these were straw men constructed by constructivists);
and there are those who think that anything we know about the world is
mediated through culture in order to be knowledge. There is no
knowledge, according to the constructivist, which *is* reality itself
(and by implication, anything you know is constructed). Knowledge is a
human product. And this is why I am studying the construction of
homosexuality by 19th C doctors in England (and to a lesser extent in
Germany). It is not because I think that Westpahl, Krafft-Ebing, Ellis,
or Moll INVENTED homosexuality FOR THE FIRST TIME. It is because the
medical construction of homosexuality is different to that of Ulrichs,
Carpenter and Symonds and others. These guys had there own version of
what homosexuality was, and why it existed. This comment says nothing
at all about reality. It is purely and utterly a comment on knowledge
systems. If you do not believe me, then why are there such vast
differences between Schrenck-Notzing, Freud and Ellis (to pick some
contemporaries who are very closely related)--a rhetorical question?
And this is not to even start addressing either ancient sources (of
which I have little knowledge and only a literary interest), or other
versions of why people are homosexual, which of course would give even
greater differences between discourses (in a way derived from by
Foucault in _Archaeology of Knowledge_, NY 1972).
I suppose it is plain, then, that my own work does not address wider
cultural history (ie, outside the culture of medicine, except insofar as
there is an impact from other fields of discourse on the medical
discourses, which there of course was). But I am not especially
interested in homosexual sub-cultures in London in the period I study
unless they appear in medical documents. Even with the Boulton and Park
trial, on which I have done some work with a colleague recently, the
focus is not on B&P themselves, but on the construction and
deconstruction of evidence in the legal setting. For our purposes, it
is just as interesting to look at other aspects of forensic medicine,
but the B&P trial has other interest for my work as well. Obviously
this position is not everyone's cup of tea, but it is quite popular
amonst historians and sociologists of science and medicine. And to push
this point further, there is a world of difference between science
studies and some of the opinions voived in this debate. For example:
1) "It is entirely possible to discover, understand and experience
objective reality without the means of linguistic discourse (e.g. by
using chemical analysis), and in particular without using discourse in
its Foucauldian sense." (Rictor Norton, 7-4-99) (and I agree about
discourse in the Foucaulsdian sense. I am more inclined for Edinburgh
School sociology of scientific knowledge and Bourdieuian field
sociology)
2) "[Factors] related to measurable physiological patterns of behaviour
etc. which suggest (though they do not prove) the primacy of innate
factors." (Rictor Norton, 9-4-99)
No contemporary historian or sociologist of science (or probably
philosopher of science for that matter) would suggest that data from
test can speak for nature (ie, objective reality), and that it is not a
construct. There are thousands of extremely detailed cases about this:
see the entire journal, _Social Studies of Science_, since 1971, or for
a simpler way in, see Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch, _The Golem: what
everyone should know about science_, Cambridge, 1993. Experiments are
constructed. Chemistry is constructed. Mathemantics is constructed
(See David Bloor's 1976, _Knowledge and social imagery_ for this). With
in the history of science, these claims of mine are established facts
(or accepted constructions, to be reflexive!) All I am interested in
doing is applying the same kinds of techniques for the analysis of
knowledge, especially that which is considered factual knowledge, to an
area (medical construciton of homosex. in 19th C). This has political
implications about the status of knowledge, but is not overtly political
in itself (another reason why constructionists are seen to be sitting on
the fence, or worse).
Having said this, I would liek to add that a lot of the opinions voiced
in this debate share a striking similarity to those kinds of sexology
which were interested in innateness, especially in relation to other
versions of the aetiology of homosexuality like acquiredness. For
example, don't Ray Evans' 1961 explanations sound a lot like liberal
sexology, Ellis style?:
5. "the very fact that throughout the mammalian scale, a great many more
males than females engage in homosexual behavior is in itself suggestive
of a constitutional factor". (See Ellis discussing same sex activity
between pigeons as derived from Muccolli in Sexual Inversion, 1897)
6. "Despite innumerable case histories and expansive psychoanalytic
"explanations", there is no incontrovertible evidence as to how
homosexuality is acquired through life experiences. There is no known
set of conditions which invariably leads to its development". (see
Ellis discussing Schrenck-Notzing in SI, 1897, and Freud in SI 1915)
7. "When virtually all pressures and attitudes of parents and society
tend to teach and enforce heterosexual behavior, it is perplexing how
anyone learns to be homosexual." (Same ref as above)
There is a large political investment in innateness. Havelock Ellis
argued, as did/do others, that if homosexuality was/is innate, and
therefore natural, it should not be illegal. This is a fundamental part
of Ellis' political stance, as will be further drawn out in Chris
Nottingham's new book on Ellis, forthcoming in 1999 from Amsterdam Uni
Press, I believe. But calling medical discourses constructed, and
saying that these discourses constructed their own version of reality
(as do other discourses, even genetic markers for predisposition and
chemical tests used in the establishing of this fact), does not
undermine the scientific position. In fact, failure to suggest that
science is a human product sets up a false image of science, to my mind,
and one to which it could never aspire. There is no true, unmediated
knowledge about the world, only facts which have histories, and may one
day cease to exist... This is the epistemological problem which faces
people: how to proceed once this is established.
The debate has been fun!
Cheers, Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 20652,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Chris Willis" <chris@chriswillis.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Introduction
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:42:36 +0100
Hi!
I'm a postgrad at Birkbeck College, working on women and popular culture,
1860-1914. I've published work on the New Woman and on crime fiction, and
I'm co-editor (with Angelique Richardson) of a collection of essays on the
New Woman to be published by Macmillan in late 1999 or early 2000.
As a result of my work on the New Woman I've become interested in late 19C
and early 20C birth control and the eugenics movement. I'm also interested
in changes in the divorce laws during the 19C, fin de siecle attitudes to
female sexuality and the response to the Contagious Diseases Acts.
With all good wishes
Chris
==================================
Chris Willis
English Dept
Birkbeck College
Malet Street
London WC1E 7HX
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Crete/3783/
==================================
___________________________________________________________________
From: JNKATZ1@aol.com
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:51:02 EDT
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
I have a problem with the way Ivan Crozier formulates his objection to
essentialists' assertions. Croziers formulation is not not historically
specific or constructionist enough for me. It falls into essentialism. In
the statement below, Crozier privileges "homosexuality" as if it is the real
name of the real thing, and in the process denigrates the ontological
implications of Ulrich's "Urnings," Ellis' "sexual inverts," somebody else's
"contrary sexualism," etc. I think we have to take seriously the ontological
assertions contained in all the different definitions of the different
categories and stop privileging "homosexuality" simply because it's the
socially dominant category in contemporary Western culture.
Crozier says:
"It is not because I think that Westpahl, Krafft-Ebing, Ellis,
or Moll INVENTED homosexuality FOR THE FIRST TIME. It is because the
medical construction of homosexuality is different to that of Ulrichs,
Carpenter and Symonds and others. These guys had there own version of
what homosexuality was, and why it existed. This comment says nothing
at all about reality. It is purely and utterly a comment on knowledge
systems. "
Katz continues:
I also think that knowledge systems are integrally related to political and
economic systems (the state of professionalization of the medical profession,
the develiopment of the invert (or whatever) cutlure, the stage of
capitalism, etc.) although in subtle complicated ways, and I'm interested in
work that begins to make those connections.
But a subtle historically specific constructionism will show its value in
application, in elucidating the implications of specific empirical data, not
in general discussions such as these, altho they are fun. Wish I had more
time to take part. Must get back to finishing a historically specific
constructionist book. Best, Jonathan Ned Katz
___________________________________________________________________
From: GHekma@aol.com
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:44:00 EDT
Subject: posting
CALL FOR PAPERS
Overcoming Boundaries: Ethnicity, Gender and Sexuality
Thamyris' special 2000-issue
Issue Editors: Gert Hekma and Isabel Hoving
Thamyris wants to devote its spring 2000-issue to an exploration and
comparison of ethnic, gendered and sexual cultures, communities,
identities, knowledges and arts. Although in many publications lip
service is paid to the co-construction of the three themes, the
similarities and differences between same-sexual, ethnic and gendered
experiences in culture, society and academia are seldomly systematically
investigated or discussed. On the threshhold of the 21st century, the
insight that all of our lives are multidimensional, informed by these
three axes of social differentiation, gives particular urgency to the
project of thinking these dimensions simultaneously and comparatively.
Thamyris focuses on ethnicity, gender and sexuality to give visibility
to the variety of human identities, interests and desires, and to speak
about power, oppression and resistance. In the vision of the editors
each of the three concepts covers both the marked and the unmarked
categories within its purview. Thus, ethnicity refers not only to
non-white positionalities in a Caucasian context, but expressly concerns
itself with various constructions of whiteness. Likewise, gender is
about the construction of both women and men, while sexuality addresses
homo- and heterosexualities. We want to highlight and problematize the
ways in which ethnic, gendered and sexual categories can be used to
marginalize people, but can also be seen as empowering categories on
which communities and coalitions are built.
The articles we are looking for focus on at least the comparison of two
of the mentioned aspects, or on groups and subjects that combine several
threads. The perspective may be theoretical, epistemological, political,
historical, sociological, literary. The topics of articles may be
concrete social or educational movements or projects, specific
case-studies e.g. concerning identity or community formation where
boundaries are tested and perhaps overcome, a novel that discusses
limits and crossings, epistemological and conceptual issues, political
mobilization, and also antagonisms between groups. It has, for instance,
been observed that those marginalized in one way will often marginalize
those marked in other ways. Many cultures indulge in the adoration of
mothers, but also in the vilification of "sluts" or other independent
women. And while same-sex contacts may be available to men in some of
these cultures, little respect is given to those men who take on gay
identities. White gay men in various Western European countries target
Moroccan youth for their alleged anti-homosexual aggression. Dominant
versions of feminism have been confronted with great difficulties in
overcoming ethnic and heterosexual boundaries. How does the hegemonic
reinsert itself in what is oppositional? How do we proceed in a world
that produces ever more social, sexual, gendered and ethnic
differentiations? What is the influence of class on various
configurations? How will we be able to create societies that offer
easier access to education, economic resources, cultural products,
political participation, various positions for everybody?
Deadline for submission: December 21, 1999
Scheduled date of publication: June 2000
Articles, requests, proposals, or abstracts should be sent to the issue
editors: c/o Gert Hekma, Dept. of Sociology, Amsterdam University, Oude
Hoogstraat 24, 1012 CE Amsterdam, The Netherlands
emails: hekma@pscw.uva.nl and ihoving@hovi.demon.nl
An Instruction to Contributors and information about the journal are
available on request:
The editors of Thamyris c/o Nanny de Vries, Najade Press, P.O. Box
75933, 1070 AX Amsterdam, The Netherlands; fax +31-20-679 8874; email
thamyris@wxs.nl or najade@wxs.nl
Summary:
Thamyris' special 2000-issue:"Overcoming Boundaries: Ethnicity, Gender
and Sexuality"
The spring issue of Thamyris wants to focus on the similarities and
differences of ethnic, gendered and sexual identities, communities,
movements. We look for articles that discuss these groups, their
interrelations and oppositions, possibilities for coalition and strive.
Articles may be both
theoretical and more practical. Case studies of cooperation and conflict
are welcome. Thamyris is an interdisciplinary journal that pays special
attention to ethnic, gendered and queer themes.
Articles, requests, proposals, or abstracts should be sent in duplicate
before 21 December, 1999 to the issue editors, c/o Gert Hekma, Dept. of
Sociology, Amsterdam University, Oude Hoogstraat 24, 1012 CE Amsterdam,
The Netherlands, or by email hekma@pscw.uva.nl and ihoving@hovi.demon.nl
--
Editors of Thamyris
c/o Nanny de Vries
Najade Press
P.O. Box 75933
1070 AX Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Fax: +31-20-679-8874
Phone: +31-20-471-3305
Email: najade@wxs.nl or thamyris@wxs.nl
___________________________________________________________________
From: MillerJimE@aol.com
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 20:26:54 EDT
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
This isn't about sexuality per se, but I have recently been reading
Phantoms in the Brain by VS Ramachandran and S Blakeslee (William Morrow,
1998) in which the authors use essentialism to discover how we construct
"reality" in our brains. This book has provided a surreal counterpoint to
the discussion on essentialism and constructivism. Has anyone else read this
book or think it might speak to the debate between essentialists and
constructivists?
Jim Miller
In a message dated 04/12/1999 5:59:44 AM Central Daylight Time,
s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au writes:
<< The unsolvable debate about essentialism and constructivism has, I
think, been manifest once again in its usual form. >>
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 10:51:43 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
Dear Dr Katz,
You are exactly right. My use of homosexuality as shorthand for
categories forged by Ulrichs, Moll, Ellis, Westphal, etc. was
reprehensible. But in an informal discussion when there were far more
serious issues (such as the truth of science, and whether or not
genetics will have the answers!), I was hoping to get away with that
one. I should have known better.
I also agree when you write:
"knowledge systems are integrally related to political and economic
systems (the state of professionalization of the medical profession, the
develiopment of the invert (or whatever) cutlure, the stage of
capitalism, etc.) although in subtle complicated ways, and I'm
interested in work that begins to make those connections [...] a subtle
historically specific constructionism will show its value in
application, in elucidating the implications of specific empirical
data, not in general discussions such as these, altho they are fun."
And so I look forward to your forthcoming book on specific constructions
of sexuality in an historical period (by a particular field??). I, too,
am engaged in a project which I hope has all of the specificity which a
debate on an email list--although fun, as you said--can never fully
encapsulate. I suppose that email discussions make up for the vast
distance between an Australian sitting in an ugly office on a Tuesday
morning and those fortunate enough to have access to other people
interested in their project, archives and other resources without having
to fork out an international flight. Email discussions are good for
keeping me amused, but are not a substitute for the historicity which I
hope to attain when demonstrating how different knowledge systems
construct facts about different sexual desires.
Yours, essentially,
Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 00:22:17 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Eunuch thesis in constructionese
Today I dusted off my copy of Foucault's _History of Sexuality_, Volume
I, and spent the day reading it once again, just to freshen up the
lingo. As a result, I will attempt to restate my thesis about eunuchs in
the form of proper social constructionist discourse.
To wit:
The definitions of homosexuality, contrary sexual feeling, inversion,
and Uranism as constructed by their respective nineteenth century
formulators Ulrichs, Westphal, Moll, Krafft-Ebing, Freud, Ellis and
Benkert all share in common the aspect of an aversion to the opposite
sex, while at the same time there is an attraction to the same sex.
The ancient terms eunouchos and spado were constructed by many ancient
writers as denotative of a variety of figures who deviated from the norm
of maleness in that they refrained from having sex with women for a
variety of reasons, including a natural aversion, impotence, ascetic
vainglory, and physical injury. Many writers differentiated explicitly
between innate and accidental (including artificial) eunuchs.
Thus most if not all nineteenth-century constructions of homosexuality
etc. in men share with certain ancient constructions of the eunuch
condition the component of an aversion to sex with women. All of these
constructions in fact substantially consist of this lack of sexual
feeling for women (except for the accidental eunuchs).
So that one may be justified in supposing that, if there were such a
thing as a genetic characteristic occuring in human beings which
predisposed some men to lack sexual desire for women, while either not
affecting or perhaps even accentuating their sexual desire for other
men, then a man having this genetic predisposition would match the
criteria for a eunuch in the ancient world or for a homosexual in the
twentieth century.
Phew! How's that?
Mark Brustman
PS The reason this is important to me is this: Precisely because ancient
regulations against certain same-sex behaviors are often applied in
modern contexts to oppress gay people, it is necessary to identify the
exceptions acknowledged within those ancient regulations which are most
similar to the exceptional condition of gay people today so that the
inapplicability of these ancient restrictions against same-sex behavior
to gay sexuality can be demonstrated from within the modern day
Bible-thumpers' own discourse!
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 10:40:39 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Eunuch thesis in constructionese
Dear Mark Brustman,
I really liked what you were saying, especially:
"Thus most if not all nineteenth-century constructions of homosexuality
etc. in men share with certain ancient constructions of the eunuch
condition the component of an aversion to sex with women."
Most sexological constructions of same sex desire (in its many guises
from perversions to urnings) rearticualted ancient sources, or at least
acknowledged them in some way. For a very strong case of this, see John
Addington Symonds' writings, perhaps most especially his letters to
Havelock Ellis, which are reprinted in the complete letters of JAS (not
to mention Ellis' responses in the BL and at Bristol Uni).
Your reasons for being interested in this project are precisely those of
liberal sexologists like Havelock Ellis. Ellis was constructing
homosexuality as natural, as existing in lots of differnt cultures and
at different periods, and even in different animal species precisely to
argue against those who thought that it shoudl be illegal (because they
assumed that it was unnatural vice, perpetrated by sinful people who
were perverse). The reason that Ellis and Symonds' Sexual Inversion was
written, in 1897, was to change a law (1885 law ammendment act) which
the authors thought unfair (they were not successful, but at least they
tried). Ellis, in later editions, also drew on the writing of his
co-author, JAS, to do this (although they were officially dropped from
the later editions because Symonds' lit. executor demanded such on the
request of the Symonds family). Ellis was far more medically orientated
than Symonds (and this is why Symonds chose him as a co-author).
The same kinds of arguments as Ellis used are being put forward now for
the existence of the 'gay gene'. For example, your own comment:
"if there were such a thing as a genetic characteristic occuring in
human beings which predisposed some men to lack sexual desire for women,
while either not affecting or perhaps even accentuating their sexual
desire for other men, then a man having this genetic predisposition
would match the criteria for a eunuch in the ancient world or for a
homosexual in the twentieth century."
Speaking about genetically constituted homosexuality is also arguing for
the naturalness of same sex desire in order to establish impunity. My
previous comment that one should be careful to note that these genetic
discourses are constructed just as all other discourses are constructed
does not, I think, undermine the political use to which a genetic
conception of same sex desire can be put by those fighting oppression.
What it does is suggest that a) science is constructed, just like all
other discourses, and b) we must not expect too much of science, as a
human institution, when seeking THE TRUTH. This does not imply that
science does not work, that it is not constructed on established bases,
or that it should not be given credence. This would be the equivalent
of saying that Proust's "Rememberance of things past" is not worth
reading because it was written by a person, and is therefore
subjective. Science, like literature, is a human activity, and as such
we should not expect that it will give us direct access to *the truth*
(the way that certain 17th century methodologists like Descartes and
Hobbes suggested). This is why I am careful not to put too much
emphasis on a scientistic explanation, although I do appreciate that it
carries more value in contemporary society than other fields of
discourse (precisely because most people in society do not know how
science works: somehitng which had its own political process!)
Cheers, Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
___________________________________________________________________ Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 21:40:42 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: The non-male exemption
Ivan Crozier wrote:
> Your reasons for being interested in this project are precisely those of
> liberal sexologists like Havelock Ellis. Ellis was constructing
> homosexuality as natural, as existing in lots of differnt cultures and
> at different periods, and even in different animal species precisely to
> argue against those who thought that it shoudl be illegal.
>> Speaking about genetically constituted homosexuality is also arguing for
> the naturalness of same sex desire in order to establish impunity.
I am glad Ivan Crozier enjoyed my last post, but I have to protest that the
reasons Havelock Ellis and I are interested in this project are not
essentially the same at all. How could they be?? : )
Ellis and the others were arguing for naturalness indeed in order to say
that these poor homosexuals (or whatever they were) "should" not be
punished for their behavior. That is not exactly my point. I am saying that
the codes applied by Christians against gay people today (Levitical law,
Paul's letter to the Romans) were already at their inceptions not
applicable -- and not applied -- to men who were not attracted to women,
because such men at that time were not considered "male" and the codes
specifically refer to sex between "males" (a construction which was
different than that of "men": a man was a grown person who was born with a
penis, but a male was a man who used his penis for procreative purposes).
In fact, the exemption of non-male men from the general prohibition against
male passive homosexuality became a reason for castrating beautiful boys in
ancient Lydia, Greece and Rome to use as sex slaves -- because it was not
against the code to screw a nonprocreating man.
Notice that Leviticus 20:13 says literally: If a man [ish] lies with a male
[zakar] the lying of a woman [ishah], bla bla bla...
Mark Brustman
See section 4 of my website: Castration a Product of Male Lust and Mistrust
http://www.well.com/user/aquarius/section4.htm
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 09:45:03 +0100
Although it looks as though we will have to agree to disagree, I will make
three comments to Ivan Crozier's reply to my posting.
Ivan Crozier says:
><snip>
>there are those [like Crozier] who think that anything we know about the
>world is mediated through culture in order to be knowledge. There is no
>knowledge, according to the constructivist, which *is* reality itself
>(and by implication, anything you know is constructed). Knowledge is a
>human product.
<snip>
A central feature of discourse theory is that knowledge is
determined by knowledge-systems in which most constructs constitute half of
a binary pair; for example, good and evil, or male and female, can only be
understood in relation to each other and are simply fictional parts of a
single construct of power relations. But let us look at the binary opposites
of warm/cold and dry/wet. A person who lives in a house that is cold and wet
is going to develop a persistent cough, and if they don't move into a house
that is warm and dry they will develop pneumonia. No amount of discourse
will prevent this. Warm/cold and dry/wet are very clear examples of relative
terms, which are understood largely in relation to one another -- *and yet
our experience of them is directly related to their objective reality*. To
assert that our knowledge of them derives solely from knowledge-systems is
to fly in the face of the evidence that our knowledge of them is derived
from non-discursive and non-political sources such as our lungs. A pain in
the chest in this instance is a non-constructed form of knowledge,
unmediated by culture, that is linked to the external reality of wetness and
coldness. I have borrowed this example from Raymond Tallis's book
_Theorrhoea and After_ (Macmillan Press, 1998), where it is used (in more
sophisticated detail than in my summary) in his critique of postmodern
literary theory and discourse theory, and where he rebuts the extremist
epistemological position that you take.
<snip>
> But I am not especially
>interested in homosexual sub-cultures in London in the period I study
>unless they appear in medical documents. Even with the Boulton and Park
>trial, on which I have done some work with a colleague recently, the
>focus is not on B&P themselves, but on the construction and
>deconstruction of evidence in the legal setting.
This illustrates one of the problems about the history-of-ideas approach to
the history of sexuality. The history of a philosophical idea works well
because the idea at least stays at the centre of the discourse. But the
history of the idea of sexuality or the idea of the homosexual almost
invariably marginializes the subject or the human-content-bearer of that
idea. That is, homosexuals are *idealized* in this discourse, reduced to
ideological neoplatonic representations of themselves; it is part of the
methodology of that approach to systematically exclude
homosexuals-in-the-real-world from that discourse -- in the same way that
you place little or no value upon Boulton and Park as they exist outside the
field of medical/legal discourse. At worst, this is intellectually immoral.
At best, it leaves a job half done, because you then ought to go on
*evaluate the accuracy or truth* of the legal/medical discourse by comparing
it to the known lives of Boulton and Park. But of course you cannot do that
unless you believe there is an objective truth to be discovered; thus your
discourse is hollow at the centre.
<snip>
>No contemporary historian or sociologist of science (or probably
>philosopher of science for that matter) would suggest that data from
>test can speak for nature (ie, objective reality), and that it is not a
>construct. There are thousands of extremely detailed cases about this:
>see the entire journal, _Social Studies of Science_, since 1971, or for
>a simpler way in, see Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch, _The Golem: what
>everyone should know about science_, Cambridge, 1993. Experiments are
>constructed. Chemistry is constructed. Mathemantics is constructed
>(See David Bloor's 1976, _Knowledge and social imagery_ for this). With
>in the history of science, these claims of mine are established facts
>(or accepted constructions, to be reflexive!)
It is disingenuous to find support for your views by referring to the
thousands of articles in the journal _Social Studies of Science_ -- since
that journal was founded specifically to promulgate the sociology-of-science
agenda. Alan Sokal in _Intellectual Imposters_ (English edition, 1998) has a
very good critique of this new school in the sociology of science that arose
during the 1970s. Sokal does not quite accuse David Bloor of being an
intellectual imposter, but at the end of his eight-page critique of the
ambiguities and self-contradictions of Bloor's theorizing, Sokal concludes
that his view is either, at best, a "mildly interesting corrective to the
most naive psychological and sociological notions", or, at worst, "a gross
and blatant error."
You may have immersed yourself too fully in this sociological discourse to
realize that the vast majority of books by practising scientists, chemists,
mathematicians, engineers, etc. etc. give no credence to the constructivist
view of their respective disciplines. The sociology of mathematics, for
example, has achieved only limited success, in the field of the *teaching*
of mathematics rather than the *content* of mathematics (in fact its success
has been limited mainly to the teaching of mathematics at the primary and
secondary levels rather than at the post-graduate level). That is, it has
affected the teaching more than the subject or the practising mathematician.
The content of mathematics is still widely presumed to be real and objective
no matter what approach is taken to teaching that content. For example,
equilateral quadrilaterals tesselate. That is a universal objective
mathematical truth, discovered by most cultures and giving rise to
manufacturing industries for the making of tiles for floors, roofs, walls
etc. It is argued by extremists that mathematics is a white European male
construct. But if a mathematics is constructed by black African females,
equilateral quadrilaterals will still tesselate. _Learning Mathematics_, ed.
Leone Burton et al. (Falmer Press, 1998), which consists entirely of essays
by the leading constructivists of mathematics, is full of revealing
admissions like this.
Sokal has some very good critiques of those sociologists of science who
haven't the faintest understanding of the actual sciences they talk about
(as well as those who fabricate scientific gibberish deliberately to
befuddle their readers), and I would recommend his book to those who have
not yet slipped wholly into the mire of postmodern relativism. To get back
to our own field, for an excellent critique of the sociology of the
*content* of history I would recommend Richard J. Evans's book _In Defence
of History_ (1997). He suggests that the rise of Foucauldian history (in
which history is stripped of empirical facts and replaced by ideologies of
power) was due to left-wing intellectuals' need "to compensate
for their loss of power in the world at large" (due to the
decline of the working class in post-industrial society) "and within the
university as an institution" (due to the decline in the number of Ph.D.
students and the decline in the economic position of academics in relation
to other professions). "For it places enormous, indeed total intellectual
power in the hands of the academic interpreter, the critic and the
historian. . . . The past no longer has the power to confine the researcher
within the bounds of facts. Historians and critics are now omnipotent."
<snip>
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Elise Chenier" <echenier@pathcom.com>
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 13:47:54 -0500
I have been following this thread with great interest, and think its time I
weigh in with some insights from the history of those other homosexuals,
lesbians.
Feminist theory has a built-in aversion to any argument based in nature (ie
the "real") because such claims have long been used to repress, regulate and
contain the activities of women across time and culture. The same can be
said for race, and to a lesser extent, class. To this end feminist
approaches to history have demonstrated time and again that while "women" is
a category defined by the very real and historically stable fact of biology
(we cannot say reproduction because women who are unable to reproduce are
still considered to belong to that category), the meanings that are attached
to her sex change over time. My favourite author on this point is Joan
Scott. ("Gender as a Category of Analysis" in Scott, Gender and the Politics
of History, Columbia UP, 1988). Again, this also applies equally to the
category of race.
Furthermore, feminist historians have convincingly, I think, made the case
the sex and gender are inexplicably linked, a theme that might at first seem
more relevant to women, but one that has been shown to be meaningful in
understanding the historical experiences of gay men as well. Here I am
referring especially to George Chauncey's Gay New York (New York: Basic
Books, 1994). This link alone does not "prove" constructionists wrong and
essentialists right, but when understood historically, we can see that
unlike the warm/dry, cold/wet example presented by Ricton Norton, what
defines masculine and feminine, and likewise what defines homosexual and
heterosexual is neither fixed nor constant but fluctuates and mutates over
time. Here I am referring not only to sexological or religious writings, but
also to our own understanding of ourselves. Thus while male and female
identities are shaped in relation to each other (masculine tends to be what
is in that moment considered opposite to feminine) so too are sexual
identities, which is not to say that contemporary gays and lesbians define
themselves always and exclusively in opposition to heterosexuality, but that
our sense of our sexual identities is mediated by and through the messages
we receive about sexuality at large. The historian's task is to track the
shifting meanings of sex and gender through a genealogical study of
political, social, economic (etc.) power. While Foucault is often given all
the credit (or blame) for this theoretical approach, North American
feminists were travelling in a similar direction long before Foucault's work
was translated for an English audience.
While the way we understand our own sexuality, and the way it is understood
by those who seek to explain it does not address the sticky question of the
genesis of sexual inclination, 20th century lesbian and gay histories have
shown that people come to have intimate sexual relations with their own sex
for a host of different reasons. For one woman I interviewed in my study of
lesbian bar culture in post war Toronto, ten years of beatings by her
husband and the chance meeting with a group of gay women led her to give it
a go. Before the legalization of birth control, lesbianism seemed to her a
reasonable alternative to heterosexual sex, and because her new partner was
a woman, she assumed that the relationship would be more loving and caring.
Sadly, she was wrong on that last point, but she nevertheless remained a
part of Toronto's lesbian community for 10 years, eventually returning to a
heterosexual relationship.
To say that she was bisexual is far too simplistic. The lives of women such
as these invite us to abandon western systems of logic grounded in binary
oppositions such as hetero/homo. To return to Rictor Norton's wet/cold
warm/dry analogy, there is indeed a role for science in understanding human
sexuality, but as far as I can see it is limited to the biological response
to physical stimulation (which begs redressing the cold/wet binary! :) ).
The gender of who stimulates us (overlooking for the moment the question of
self-stimulation, bestiality or other variables like age and race) is not
understandable through science but rather through culture, social
conditions, systems of power and knowledge and other less precise but
equally 'discoverable' variables. Science is not, I agree, a mere construct,
but it does have its limits.
Cheers,
Elise Chenier
Queen's University,
Kingston, Ontario
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 12:11:01 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
In response (again):
Rictor Norton writes: "A central feature of discourse theory is that
knowledge is determined by knowledge-systems in which most constructs
constitute half of a binary pair; for example, good and evil, or male
and female, can only be understood in relation to each other and are
simply fictional parts of a single construct of power relations."
While this account is fundamental to certain types of constructivism,
the kind I am using in my own work is not exactly the same (in relation
to the type of determination of knowledge system). It is derived from
works like Barry Barnes, "On the conventional character of knowledge and
cognition," Phil.Soc.Sci., 1981, which is a more nuanced version of how
reality is constructed than the more structuralist, Foucauldian type
analyses, although this does not deny that many types of verbal
knowlegde are about difference, as you suggested. However, it does lead
to a workable sociological theory of knowledge which explains the
epistemological problems central to Norton's thesis.
Norton writes: "To assert that our knowledge of them derives solely from
knowledge-systems is to fly in the face of the evidence that our
knowledge of them is derived from non-discursive and non-political
sources such as our lungs."
See the Barnes article for a long version of what I would say here.
Briefly, no Strong programme sociologist would say that 'experience'
from the lungs is discursive at the base level, but nor is it knowledge,
or even understanable without discourse (its hard to think of an
example, as I would have to write it down, thus making it discursive).
But knowledge the lungs is discursive and highly conventional. It is
constructed and perpetuated by a Hessean style set of concepts which are
knotted together to give particular discourses (ie, what Lungs are, what
pain is, what cold is, etc., all of which are the basis for any
conception, theory, fact or whatever.) These things (nodes in a Hesse
net) are not natural, which is why they change. This is why there is a
history of medical writing about same sex behaviour, because the current
version of reality is always changing (eg sexological, psychoanalytical,
LeVay style neurology, biochemical, genetic, etc., all of which have at
some stage had the status of knowledge).
As for my approach to B&P, "intellectually immoral" or not, it is, I
think, simply a different project because I am interested in medical
knowledge from the past, not about the people of whom this knowledge is
constructed. It is a different job, not a job half done (after all, it
adds to the approaches which are interested in aspects of the B&P trial
at the expense of a detailed understanding of medical knowledge). As
for the objective truth at the centre of the trial (and this goes for
every thing else), I would only ask whose truth? Paul thought that they
had committed sodomy, Taylor did not, and B&P probably would not have
thought about it in terms of forensic medicine. But all of these actors
thought they had the truth. The trial itself concluded that they had
not committed sodomy, and I doubt B&P would have agreed, according to
their letters. Perhaps there are different truths out there, but only
if it is agreed that the truth is subjective...
By the way, I agree with Rictor: "That is, homosexuals are *idealized*
in this discourse, reduced to ideological neoplatonic representations of
themselves; it is part of the methodology of that approach to
systematically exclude homosexuals-in-the-real-world from that
discourse".
What I am interested in is how medicine reduced these
homosexuals/inverts/perverts/whatever to discourses (pretty much in the
same way that quarks are discovered, I suggest). If I was working on a
project about homosexuals-in-the-real-world, I would be looking at other
discourses, such as letters, etc. But this is a different project.
Perhaps next grant?
Norton writes: "It is disingenuous to find support for your views by
referring to the thousands of articles in the journal _Social Studies of
Science_ -- since that journal was founded specifically to promulgate
the sociology-of-science agenda."
Is it not disingenuous to find support for your critique by using a well
known critic, especially one who is in direct opposition to the
sociology of science?
This is not really the place to argue it, but briefly my feeling is that
Sokal does not like the sociology of science because he does not think
that it has a right to comment on science. This was the feeling which
came out of the debate with Latour (where Latour said he knew a lot of
scientists who were not frogs, but who studied frogs). What is at stake
is who has the right to speak about whom. The science wars, as they
have come to be known, centre on this, for some scientists are not happy
about sociological theories of knowledge which discuss the
epistemological strength of any and all knowledge claims (thus getting
rid of the Cartesian models of science being the truth: something which
was initially set up to argue that mechanical natural philosophy was
better than other knowledge systems like magic because it is not based
on dogma but on objective reality which is ascertained by various
methods, including epistmic justifications.) Surfice it to say that
sociologists of knowledge, after extensive ethnomethodological studies
of science, as well as philosophical inquiries, have found that
knowledge does not work like this, and particularly science does not.
To science's defence springs Alan Sokal, with others like Jean Bricmont,
Gross and Levitt, etc. The debate is about right to speak about
something, not about whether science is right and sociology of science
is wrong (in fact, sociologists side-step the debate by sociologically
analysing the responses by Sokal etc.)
As for scientists not taking on board the writings of sociologists, who
cares? Sociologists and historians write for sociologists and
historians. Just as scientists write for scientists. Really, they all
have their own _sui generis_ constructions, and should not be so
paranoid about other versions of reality. After all, chemists do not
freak out because physicists think that a jar of helium gas is made out
of molecules not atoms... why would some of them freak out because
sociologists say that science does not equate with the images of science
which developed post-Descartes? And the existence of Sokal's book will
not prevent many sociologists studying science, just as the soicology of
science will not stop Sokal writing books.
Do you really think that my position is postmodern relativism? I don't;
it does not use the right jargon, although if being a postmodernist is
simply thinking that actors in the world construct reality in relation
to what they have been taught, then perhaps I am (sans black skivvy).
As you have said, we do not agree on this topic. However, this does not
mean that you cannot read my works (which are more historical than
theoretical), and I cannot read yours, but what we will get from them is
going to medicated by what we believe to be the truth.
Cheerio,
Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
___________________________________________________________________ Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 11:29:58 -0700 (MST)
From: Tim Hodgdon <Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu>
Subject: Constructionist/essentialist
Elise Chenier's message prompts me to finish this post, which I began to
write several days ago.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Dear fellow list members:
This interesting thread has developed as a debate over the
origin--natural or cultural--of the differences that distinguish those
whom we today call homosexuals, from heterosexuals.
I notice an important continuity in the evidence offered by both
constructionist and essentialist participants: the genderedness of the
sexual behavior in question. But I also notice that this genderedness
has gone unremarked in the thread. The thread is not unique in that
regard: such silence marks much of the history of sexuality and many
sexual liberation movements as well.
Allow me to elaborate: From my familiarity with the history of modern
U.S. movements of sexual liberation, it seems to me that it is very rare
for men, but less so for women (lesbian feminists, in particular), to
advocate same-sex eroticism as an opposition to gender as a fundamental
principle of social organization. Some examples of men who stand out as
exceptions to this general rule can be found in *Out of the Closets,*
ed. Jay and Young, and John Stoltenberg, who seems to be one of the few
who continue to advocate this perspective from the early phase of Gay
Liberation. For the most part, that perspective has been replaced by
opposition to specific forms of gender organization: what counts as
"sex radicalism" nowadays is the strategy of "playing with gender" *a
la* Judith Butler, in opposition to the bourgeois model of compulsory
heterosexuality within companionate marriage, rather than an opposition
to gender *per se.* (Butler would argue that playing with gender
destabilizes it, but I'm not convinced that this is true.)
It seems to me that both the Foucauldian and the essentialist emphasis
on "differences" lead to a debate over which differences matter and why,
while taking as a given the common assumption (both historical and
historiographical) from which the debate proceeds: that gender
difference (whether naturalized as "the sex difference" or taken as a
cultural construct) is the basis for human eroticism. Rather than being
a debate about gender as a first principle of social organization,
struggles between gay and straight have been a debate over which
interpretation of gendered first principles should be accorded social
legitimacy. (Those of you familiar with Steve J. Stern's *The Secret
History of Gender: Women, Men, and Power in Late Colonial Mexico* will
recognize this pattern of cultural conflict as one not limited to this
particular debate.) Foucault's valorization of "bodies and pleasures"
as the appropriate response to the bourgeois power/knowledge of sex
stands for me as a primary case in point--one that further fuels my
distrust of the Butlerian argument about playing with gender. If gender
is so much fun to "play" with, is there a serious commitment there to
END it?
Because I perceive systematic attention to gender *at this level of
analysis* as fundamentally disruptive to the project of the Foucauldian
history of sexuality, I've begun to think about the possibility of a new
school of the history of sexuality, one grounded in an explicitly
anti-Foucauldian social constructionism. Is anyone else out there
thinking in those terms?
Tim Hodgdon
Ph.D. candidate
Teaching Associate
Department of History
Arizona State University
Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 20:32:11 +0100
The example that Elise Chenier mentions of the woman who left her husband,
became part of a lesbian culture for ten years, then went back to a
heterosexual relationship, occurs often enough to be the subject of several
studies and continuing research. Such cases -- i.e. women who are
exclusively heterosexual for a long period and then exclusively homosexual
for a long period, and then maybe exclusively heterosexual for a long
period, which we cannot dismiss by alleging "confusion" over sexual
identity -- are often treated as evidence for the importance of cultural
factors in directing sexuality, and as evidence for
the view that sexuality is malleable (rather than "fixed" in an
"orientation"). Elise Chenier is absolutely correct that "To say that she
was bisexual is far too simplistic." But there are some interesting
interrelated characteristics of this phenomenon, all
illustrated by the woman Elise Chenier mentions, that I would highlight:
This transitional phenomenon is experienced mostly by women rather than by
men. There may be cultural reasons for this apparent limitation to one
sex/gender. The reasons may also be biologically grounded in ways that
female sexual arousal differs from male sexual arousal and that the female
sex drive is more diffuse than the male sex drive (but I won't rehearse
these arguments here). In most cases the transition moves in a fixed
direction: the first stage is almost always straight, and the second stage
is almost always lesbian -- the reverse seldom occurs; and in most cases the
movement comprises only two or three stages -- from straight, to lesbian,
and sometimes back to straight -- rather than constantly shifting back and
forth. There may be cultural reasons for this seemingly fixed directional
pattern. Or there may be non-cultural reasons, arising from an inborn sex
"drive" which knows where it's going and gets there despite cultural
pressures and despite temporary deflections. Most of the women in the group
who go from straight to lesbian and then back to straight will ascribe their
motivation to cultural factors, as in the case mentioned by Elise Chenier.
Most of the women in the group who go from straight to lesbian and who stay
lesbian will ascribe their motivation to essential factors, usually by
claiming that they discovered their real self.
It seems to me that these very characteristic patterns raise the probability
of such things as inborn sex drives and orientations. That is, they suggest
the possible importance of essential factors that really cannot be so easily
dismissed by Elise Chenier's
statement that "The lives of women such as these invite us to abandon
western systems of logic grounded in binary oppositions such as
hetero/homo." That claim is also far too simplistic.
[Incidentally, my earlier wet/dry analogy etc. was intended to suggest that
although wet/dry etc. is a cultural construct and binary dichotomy, wetness
and dryness etc. also had objective realities independent of one another and
independent of the binary construct. The unspoken analogy of course was that
I believe this to be true of hetero/homo -- which, though also a binary
construct, each have their own objective existence *independent* of one
another. Well, enough of that.]
Lillian Faderman in _Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian
Life in Twentieth-Century America_ (1991) dicusses the phenomenon of the
large numbers of American women who "chose" to become lesbians during the
1970s in the wake of radical feminism: "the 1970s offer a prime example of
sexuality as a social construct. It was demonstrated in that
decade how the spirt of an era could influence sexual behavior in large
numbers of people at least as much as those other factors that had long been
regarded as determining sexuality." However, Faderman acknowledges that the
lesbian choice was partly made possible for large numbers by the radical
redefinition of lesbianism, a definition that practically erased sexual
desire and replaced it with the political identification of
"woman-identified-woman", whereby a "lesbian" became a woman who fought
against heterosexual hegemony rather than a woman who had raunchy desires
for women. Faderman then relegates to a footnote a reference to a study by
Elizabeth Wilson (1983) which suggests that "many of the young women who
elected to become lesbians through radical feminist dogma were doomed to
disillusionment and eventually returned to heterosexuality"; and to a study
by Zira Defries (1976) which showed that "two-thirds of the lesbian-feminist
students Defries treated returned, more or less, to heterosexuality." This
1970s phenomenon is the strongest support that Faderman could offer for the
constructivist model of sexuality. It seems clear to me, on the contrary,
that those women who *remained* in their "choice" of lesbianism were pretty
much lesbians to begin with, either because they exploited radical feminism
as an opportunity to come out, or because they discovered their "true
selves" through consciousness-raising etc.
This whole phenomenon of "straight--lesbian--(maybe straight again)"
suggests not only that there is an underlying orientation at the biological
level that can sometimes, during periods of great stress or cultural
pressure, be overlain by an artificially constructed orientation, but that
the pull of the biological-level orientation often proves too strong to
resist indefinitely.
Elise Chenier asserts that "The historian's task is to track the shifting
meanings of sex and gender through a genealogical study of political,
social, economic (etc..) power." There is a strong tendency for gay and
lesbian historians, like Faderman, to privilege change and to marginalize
resistance to change (to avoid acknowledging "reversion" as shown in the
cases cited by Faderman and Elise Chenier). It is also the historian's task
to document the repeated patterns and recurrent meanings of sex and gender
and the struggle of the human bearers of sex and gender against the
imposition of meanings upon them.
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 21:33:54 +0100
Ivan Crozier writes:
<As you have said, we do not agree on this topic. However, this does not
<mean that you cannot read my works (which are more historical than
<theoretical), and I cannot read yours, but what we will get from them is
<going to mediated by what we believe to be the truth.
I have indeed read both of your essays on the Boulton and Park case, with
pleasure and profit, and with a much greater understanding of the case.
Within the specific focus you set for yourself, namely the importance of the
trial for the construction of the British medical profession's knowledge of
homosexuality, it is clearer and more comprehensive and more persuasive than
any other articles touching on the subject. And with that gracious comment,
proving that I have an essential heart of gold, I shall withdraw from the
fray.
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 12:49:21 -0400 (EDT)
From: "David F. Greenberg" <dg4@is3.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: Constructionist/essentialist
I count myself as a social constructionist who disagrees with Foucault on
many matters. But I could not understand what you are getting at in this
message, or how your perspective sheds new light on the history of
sexuality. - David Greenberg, Sociology Department, New York University
On Thu, 15 Apr 1999, Tim Hodgdon wrote:
> Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
> > Elise Chenier's message prompts me to finish this post, which I began to
> write several days ago.
> -----------------------------------------------------------
> Dear fellow list members:
> > This interesting thread has developed as a debate over the
> origin--natural or cultural--of the differences that distinguish those
> whom we today call homosexuals, from heterosexuals.
> > I notice an important continuity in the evidence offered by both
> constructionist and essentialist participants: the genderedness of the
> sexual behavior in question. But I also notice that this genderedness
> has gone unremarked in the thread. The thread is not unique in that
> regard: such silence marks much of the history of sexuality and many
> sexual liberation movements as well.
> > Allow me to elaborate: From my familiarity with the history of modern
> U.S. movements of sexual liberation, it seems to me that it is very rare
> for men, but less so for women (lesbian feminists, in particular), to
> advocate same-sex eroticism as an opposition to gender as a fundamental
> principle of social organization. Some examples of men who stand out as
> exceptions to this general rule can be found in *Out of the Closets,*
> ed. Jay and Young, and John Stoltenberg, who seems to be one of the few
> who continue to advocate this perspective from the early phase of Gay
> Liberation. For the most part, that perspective has been replaced by
> opposition to specific forms of gender organization: what counts as
> "sex radicalism" nowadays is the strategy of "playing with gender" *a
> la* Judith Butler, in opposition to the bourgeois model of compulsory
> heterosexuality within companionate marriage, rather than an opposition
> to gender *per se.* (Butler would argue that playing with gender
> destabilizes it, but I'm not convinced that this is true.)
> > It seems to me that both the Foucauldian and the essentialist emphasis
> on "differences" lead to a debate over which differences matter and why,
> while taking as a given the common assumption (both historical and
> historiographical) from which the debate proceeds: that gender
> difference (whether naturalized as "the sex difference" or taken as a
> cultural construct) is the basis for human eroticism. Rather than being
> a debate about gender as a first principle of social organization,
> struggles between gay and straight have been a debate over which
> interpretation of gendered first principles should be accorded social
> legitimacy. (Those of you familiar with Steve J. Stern's *The Secret
> History of Gender: Women, Men, and Power in Late Colonial Mexico* will
> recognize this pattern of cultural conflict as one not limited to this
> particular debate.) Foucault's valorization of "bodies and pleasures"
> as the appropriate response to the bourgeois power/knowledge of sex
> stands for me as a primary case in point--one that further fuels my
> distrust of the Butlerian argument about playing with gender. If gender
> is so much fun to "play" with, is there a serious commitment there to
> END it?
> > Because I perceive systematic attention to gender *at this level of
> analysis* as fundamentally disruptive to the project of the Foucauldian
> history of sexuality, I've begun to think about the possibility of a new
> school of the history of sexuality, one grounded in an explicitly
> anti-Foucauldian social constructionism. Is anyone else out there
> thinking in those terms?
> > Tim Hodgdon
> Ph.D. candidate
> Teaching Associate
> Department of History
> Arizona State University
> Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu
> > ___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 12:59:30 -0400 (EDT)
From: "David F. Greenberg" <dg4@is3.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: You say essentialism, I say constructivism...
Two or three years ago, at the Boston meeting of the Eastern Sociological
Society, two papers were presented on a sexuality panel. One dealt with
women who became lesbians in mid-life, the other on women who abandoned
lesbianism in midlife, in favor of heterosexual realtions. Both papers
were based on in-depth interviews. Culture wouldn't be quite the right
word for the explanations of the transitions that emerged from these two
studies. For the women who became lesbians, it was social networks that
were critical. This meant seeing that a viable life could be had in a
community of women, with activities revolving around feminist
organizations, potluck suppers, softball teams, friendship networks, and
so forth. For the women who abandoned lesbian relationships, the costs of
maintaining them were important. It was simply easier to be straight than
lesbian. This meant less hassles with parents, with being a parent, with
adopting children, less anxiety over losing a job, and so forth. It may be
some of those lesbian-feminists abandoned lesbianism because it didn't
work for them (a constitutional theory that would be equally compatible
with innateness and with early childhood experience creating a sort of
imprinting that cannot easily be changed later), or because the movement
and communities that made up the movement were falling apart, or became
unpleasant for some of the participants. - David Greenberg, Sociology
Department, New York University.
On Thu, 15 Apr 1999, Rictor Norton wrote:
> Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
> > The example that Elise Chenier mentions of the woman who left her husband,
> became part of a lesbian culture for ten years, then went back to a
> heterosexual relationship, occurs often enough to be the subject of several
> studies and continuing research. Such cases -- i.e. women who are
> exclusively heterosexual for a long period and then exclusively homosexual
> for a long period, and then maybe exclusively heterosexual for a long
> period, which we cannot dismiss by alleging "confusion" over sexual
> identity -- are often treated as evidence for the importance of cultural
> factors in directing sexuality, and as evidence for
> the view that sexuality is malleable (rather than "fixed" in an
> "orientation"). Elise Chenier is absolutely correct that "To say that she
> was bisexual is far too simplistic." But there are some interesting
> interrelated characteristics of this phenomenon, all
> illustrated by the woman Elise Chenier mentions, that I would highlight:
> > This transitional phenomenon is experienced mostly by women rather than by
> men. There may be cultural reasons for this apparent limitation to one
> sex/gender. The reasons may also be biologically grounded in ways that
> female sexual arousal differs from male sexual arousal and that the female
> sex drive is more diffuse than the male sex drive (but I won't rehearse
> these arguments here). In most cases the transition moves in a fixed
> direction: the first stage is almost always straight, and the second stage
> is almost always lesbian -- the reverse seldom occurs; and in most cases the
> movement comprises only two or three stages -- from straight, to lesbian,
> and sometimes back to straight -- rather than constantly shifting back and
> forth. There may be cultural reasons for this seemingly fixed directional
> pattern. Or there may be non-cultural reasons, arising from an inborn sex
> "drive" which knows where it's going and gets there despite cultural
> pressures and despite temporary deflections. Most of the women in the group
> who go from straight to lesbian and then back to straight will ascribe their
> motivation to cultural factors, as in the case mentioned by Elise Chenier.
> Most of the women in the group who go from straight to lesbian and who stay
> lesbian will ascribe their motivation to essential factors, usually by
> claiming that they discovered their real self.
> > It seems to me that these very characteristic patterns raise the probability
> of such things as inborn sex drives and orientations. That is, they suggest
> the possible importance of essential factors that really cannot be so easily
> dismissed by Elise Chenier's
> statement that "The lives of women such as these invite us to abandon
> western systems of logic grounded in binary oppositions such as
> hetero/homo." That claim is also far too simplistic.
> > [Incidentally, my earlier wet/dry analogy etc. was intended to suggest that
> although wet/dry etc. is a cultural construct and binary dichotomy, wetness
> and dryness etc. also had objective realities independent of one another and
> independent of the binary construct. The unspoken analogy of course was that
> I believe this to be true of hetero/homo -- which, though also a binary
> construct, each have their own objective existence *independent* of one
> another. Well, enough of that.]
> > Lillian Faderman in _Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian
> Life in Twentieth-Century America_ (1991) dicusses the phenomenon of the
> large numbers of American women who "chose" to become lesbians during the
> 1970s in the wake of radical feminism: "the 1970s offer a prime example of
> sexuality as a social construct. It was demonstrated in that
> decade how the spirt of an era could influence sexual behavior in large
> numbers of people at least as much as those other factors that had long been
> regarded as determining sexuality." However, Faderman acknowledges that the
> lesbian choice was partly made possible for large numbers by the radical
> redefinition of lesbianism, a definition that practically erased sexual
> desire and replaced it with the political identification of
> "woman-identified-woman", whereby a "lesbian" became a woman who fought
> against heterosexual hegemony rather than a woman who had raunchy desires
> for women. Faderman then relegates to a footnote a reference to a study by
> Elizabeth Wilson (1983) which suggests that "many of the young women who
> elected to become lesbians through radical feminist dogma were doomed to
> disillusionment and eventually returned to heterosexuality"; and to a study
> by Zira Defries (1976) which showed that "two-thirds of the lesbian-feminist
> students Defries treated returned, more or less, to heterosexuality." This
> 1970s phenomenon is the strongest support that Faderman could offer for the
> constructivist model of sexuality. It seems clear to me, on the contrary,
> that those women who *remained* in their "choice" of lesbianism were pretty
> much lesbians to begin with, either because they exploited radical feminism
> as an opportunity to come out, or because they discovered their "true
> selves" through consciousness-raising etc.
> > This whole phenomenon of "straight--lesbian--(maybe straight again)"
> suggests not only that there is an underlying orientation at the biological
> level that can sometimes, during periods of great stress or cultural
> pressure, be overlain by an artificially constructed orientation, but that
> the pull of the biological-level orientation often proves too strong to
> resist indefinitely.
> > Elise Chenier asserts that "The historian's task is to track the shifting
> meanings of sex and gender through a genealogical study of political,
> social, economic (etc..) power." There is a strong tendency for gay and
> lesbian historians, like Faderman, to privilege change and to marginalize
> resistance to change (to avoid acknowledging "reversion" as shown in the
> cases cited by Faderman and Elise Chenier). It is also the historian's task
> to document the repeated patterns and recurrent meanings of sex and gender
> and the struggle of the human bearers of sex and gender against the
> imposition of meanings upon them.
> > --
> Rictor Norton
> mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
> http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
>
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 19:12:32 -0700 (MST)
From: Tim Hodgdon <Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu>
Subject: Re: Constructionist/essentialist
On Fri, 16 Apr 1999, David F. Greenberg wrote:
> I count myself as a social constructionist who disagrees with Foucault on
> many matters. But I could not understand what you are getting at in this
> message, or how your perspective sheds new light on the history of
> sexuality. - David Greenberg, Sociology Department, New York University
Thanks for letting me know. Since I've already succeeded in befuddling
at least one list member, I won't presume that I already understand
which aspects of my posting weren't clear. Can you, and perhaps other
list members as well, formulate a question or questions for me to
respond to? Let me know, either on or off the list.
Tim Hodgdon
Ph.D. candidate
Teaching Associate
Department of History
Arizona State University
Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Lesley Hall" <lesleyah@primex.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Constructionist/essentialist
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 21:01:51 +0100
Tim Hodgdon wrote:
>I've begun to think about the possibility of a new
>school of the history of sexuality, one grounded in an explicitly
>anti-Foucauldian social constructionism. Is anyone else out there
>thinking in those terms?
This sounds intriguing - could you elaborate? How would it relate to the
independent school of social constructionism slightly preceding Foucault's
work (or at least its translation and dissemination among English-speaking
academics) emerging from 'second-wave' feminism, gay liberation etc?
Lesley
Lesley Hall
lesleyah@primex.co.uk
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 09:21:42 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Constructionist/essentialist
Dear Tim Hogdon,
You wrote:
"Because I perceive systematic attention to gender *at this level of
analysis* as fundamentally disruptive to the project of the Foucauldian
history of sexuality, I've begun to think about the possibility of a new
school of the history of sexuality, one grounded in an explicitly
anti-Foucauldian social constructionism. Is anyone else out there
thinking in those terms?"
I think that there are many other schools of social construction which
do not deal with the construction of knowledge in anything like the way
Foucault did. I am thinking of the "Sociology of scientific knowledge"
schools, to be found in works by Barry Barnes, Harry Collins, Trevor
Pinch, Michael Mulkay, and many others. Take a look at journals like
_Social Studies of Science_, _Social Epistemology_, and others. These
works are not explicitly anti-Foucauldian. They just operate at a
different level of construction, and so quite safely ignore Foucault's
work. Personally, I think that each school acts as a good corrective to
the problems of the other (ie, Foucault's large scale, essentially
structuralist line of thinking can be loosened up by applying SSK, but
SSK is too micro-sociological to allow for the kinds of generalisatrions
which MF offers.). I also recommend Pierre Bourdieu's field sociology
as a mid-way point, and as a way forward in its own right (his ideas on
doxa I find more convincing that MF's ideas of power--and I think that
gender operates as doxa: see PB, _Outline of a theory of practice_).
Bourdieu deals with power in a way I prefer to MF (perhaps I should ask
myself why I bother to read MF at all, when I find myself having to
correct him with stuff I think is better anyway???)
I hope that this helps.
Cheers, Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
From: "Dan Healey" <ddh@arts.gla.ac.uk>
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 00:27:20 +0000
Subject: Red as a male homo signal ca 1900-1940?
A question about subcultural signals:
Does anyone know about Continental European examples of the use of red-
coloured garments (neckties, handkerchiefs, etc) as signals of interest in male-
male sex, ca. 1900-1940? For the USA on this point I am aware of Chauncey,
Gay New York, pp. 3, 52, 54; Berube, Coming Out under Fire, p. 123; and
Havelock Ellis, Sexual Inversion, pp. 299-300. German, Austrian or other
Eastern Euro examples would bemost welcome - but French instances would
also be useful. I have a reference to St Petersburg's "homosexuals" wearing
same in 1908 and want to cross-check and contextualize it if possible.
You can reply to: ddh@arts.gla.ac.uk
Thanks!
Dan Healey
Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine
School of History and Archaeology
University of Glasgow
5 University Gardens
Glasgow G12 8QQ
Tel. (0141) 330-5553
Fax (0141) 330-3511
PLEASE NOTE NEW EMAIL: ddh@arts.gla.ac.uk
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Tue, 20 Apr 1999 22:17:27 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Re: Red as a male homo signal ca 1900-1940?
Magnus Hirschfeld lists a lot of hand signals that men used to signal one another,
and he mentions handkerchiefs, but white ones. The color red or pink doesn't come
up in the paragraph on "symbolic language" (pp. 693-694) in his tome _Die
Homosexualität_ (1914). But he does cite another article on the subject by A. Moll.
Hirschfeld:
"... Peculiarities of dress are likewise often mentioned by homosexuals as signs of
recognition: for men a chain ring [Kettenring], for women a signet ring on the
little finger, certain gems like sapphires, peculiarly tied ties. In the thirties
of the last century in Berlin, a white pocket handkerchief sticking out of the
upper jacket pocket was considered very "suspicious". Others too see carrying the
handkerchief in the hand as indicative. Might not the expression once used in
France for a contrary-sexual man, "chevalier de la manchette", also have its origin
in homosexual dressing styles? Finally, certain flowers in the button hole have
been seen as typical, namely carnations in England.[footnote 17] Yet the
significance of all of these signs must not be overestimated.[footnote 18]"
[footnote 17:] Cf. Hichens, "The green carnation." A mockery of Oscar Wilde.
[footnote 18:] Cf. Moll, "Wie erkennen und verständigen sich die Homosexuellen
untereinander?" ("How do homosexuals recognize and communicate with one another?")
In Gross' Archiv, Vol. 9, Nos. 2 and 3, 1902, pp. 157-159 and discussions of these
papers by Prätorius in Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen, Vol. V, Part 2, p.
993.
Unfortunately these references, Gross' Archiv and Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen, may be somewhat hard to get hold of.
Mark Brustman
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Red as a male homo signal ca 1900-1940?
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 14:50:53 +0100
I've seen the claim that red neck-scarves were used in Venice in the same
way red ties were used in New York circa 1910, but no source was cited.
Sorry. Ellis's reference to this "badge of all their tribe" is the earliest
reference to colour I've seen (i.e. last decade of 19th cent.).The
association of course was the connection of the colour red with (female)
prostitution. For good illustrations of red ties 1910-1940, see many
red-tied fairies in the paintings of Paul Cadmus.
The information about red scarves in Venice might come from John Addington
Symonds (Ellis's collaborator on Sexual Inversion), but I can't locate it.
Symonds was fascinated by the colour blue, writing a whole book about how
lovely his gondolier boyfriends looked in their blue outfits, and taking a
host of photographs of them thus attired. I have a never-published
photograph of Augusto, the model for his book _In the Key of Blue_ at my
website, but of course it's in sepia! Please do not publish or redistribute
without contacting me.
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/symonds.htm
White handkerchiefs were used as homoerotic signifiers in 18th-cent. England
and the Netherlands, back to the 1720s. But handkerchiefs were always white
through most of their history. Female prostitutes always used handkerchiefs
to "innocently" attract attention to themselves, and men did the same.
I don't think the use of colours specifically as homoerotic indicators
goes back further than c. 1890. But if you get into the murky realm of
colour symbolism, you can note the association of red specifically with
Hindu deities associated with transgenderism and same-sex desire
(Bahucharamata, Ganesha, and others), and the association of red with
the Hijras.
By the late 18th cent. in England the mollies had developed a
repertoire of secret signs and dress codes by which they could
recognize one another in public places. According to an account
published in 1781:
These wretches have many ways and means of conveying
intelligence, and many signals by which they discover
themselves to each other; they have likewise several houses
of rendezvous, whither they resort: but their chief place
of meeting is the Bird-cage Walk, in St. James's Park,
whither they resort about twilight.
They are easily discovered by their signals, which
are pretty nearly as follow: If one of them sits on a
bench, he pats the backs of his hands; if you follow them,
they put a white handkerchief thro' the skirts of their
coat, and wave it to and fro; but if they are met by you,
their thumbs are stuck in the arm-pits of their waistcoats,
and they play their fingers upon their breasts.
By means of these signals they retire to satisfy a
passion too horrible for description, too detestable for
language. (quoted in Trumbach 1977)
This technique continued for as long as men wore frock-coats etc. (i.e.
conspicuously split at the backside, through which the handkerchief could be
thrust, and waved about "absent-mindedly"). There is a 19th-cent. photograph
of a man doing just this (I think obviously gay, in company with another
man) in James Gardiner's _Who's a Pretty Boy Then?_. The modern equivalent
of this gesture is hooking the thumb in the jean-pocket and letting the
fingers toy about the crotch, perhaps playing with a bunch of keys. Then of
course there is the hanky code for more specialized tastes, but that's a
much later date.
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 22:12:37 -0700 (MST)
From: Tim Hodgdon <Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu>
Subject: Re: Constructionist/essentialist
On Fri, 16 Apr 1999, Lesley Hall wrote:
> Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
> > Tim Hodgdon wrote:
> >I've begun to think about the possibility of a new
> >school of the history of sexuality, one grounded in an explicitly
> >anti-Foucauldian social constructionism. Is anyone else out there
> >thinking in those terms?
> > This sounds intriguing - could you elaborate? How would it relate to the
> independent school of social constructionism slightly preceding Foucault's
> work (or at least its translation and dissemination among English-speaking
> academics) emerging from 'second-wave' feminism, gay liberation etc?
>> Lesley Hall
> lesleyah@primex.co.uk
Thanks for your question. I've been immersed in grading, so haven't
been able to respond sooner.
The second wave, and the idealistic early years of gay liberation, are a
main source of inspiration for me. I entered graduate study after a
long time away from academia, and the postmodern turn in women's history
took me quite by surprise. After five years, I'm only now beginning to
be able to articulate why I don't find it convincing (while at the same
time recognizing that Foucauldianism has done much to make the
historical study of sexuality legitimate, enabling my own work). Of
course, "second wave" covers a lot of conflicting theorizing about
sexuality. I find most persuasive those theories that link processes of
sexual objectification to the perpetuation of gender hierarchy: that is,
those theories that argue, in sum, that the practice of gendered
sexuality enforces gender hierarchy.
There are some real challenges in applying this standpoint in historical
research. The most daunting of these is the simple fact that most of
the evidence one would like to have about the past practice of sexual
objectification--especially women's experience of it, in particular
their experience of gender-reifying intercourse, during intercourse, was
never committed to writing, and disappeared at those women's deaths.
Nevertheless, the situation is not hopeless: we do have some interesting
examples of women writing in historically specific language that
analyzes the phenomenon. For instance, in Ann Braude's *Radical
Spirits: Spiritualism and Women's Rights in Nineteenth-Century America,*
there are fascinating passages of primary material describing women
"spirit mediums'" experiences of being objectified by male audiences --
couched in pre-Darwinian, pre-sexological, cultural-absolutist language
that presumes gender complementarity/equality as God's will. Evidence
such as this helps, I think, to put into historical perspective the
conditions under which an explicitly feminist consciousness of sexual
objectification as a fundamental political practice of male-supremacist
culture can emerge, and thus why it has been so rarely in history. A
"second-wave" social constructionism, then, must insist on the
historical significance of so much historical silence as a part of its
method.
Such a social constructionism must also be multi-disciplinary in its
model-making. For instance, in rejecting biological determinism as an
explanation for men's practice of sexual aggression, we need a theory of
psychology that can explain how loyalty to the social construct of
manhood can coexist with, and manifest as a means to satisfy, the
overpowering need of human beings for connection to others. Here, I
believe that attachment theory probably offers many advantages over
Freudianism's fanciful and melodramatic "Oedipus complex" and "libido,"
etc. An anti-Foucauldian social constructionism must expand on the
second wave's insights into the politics of the cultural belief in "the
sex difference" as a political construct by drawing on Leslie Tanner's
argument that the sexual selection of mates by pre-*sapiens* females
influenced human evolution in the direction of minimizing sexual
dimorphism.
These are mostly musings on my part. I don't pretend that I yet have a
systematic understanding of what would be involved in such an
intellectual project, other than that it must be the collaborative
creation of many hands. There's nothing I'd like more than to be a part
of such a project, and I'd be glad to hear from others who feel the
same.
Tim Hodgdon
Ph.D. candidate
Teaching Associate
Department of History
Arizona State University
Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
Subject: Re: red as a male homosignal
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 19:14:40 -0500
From: "Michael J. Murphy" <mjmurphy@artsci.wustl.edu>
You might want to peruse the text and notes of Henning Bech's When Men
Meet (U. Chicago, 1997) which has extensive discussions of urban codes
and subtexts, especially those constituting fashion and personal
demeanor. The index does not list bandanas or specific colors, but it
might be worth examining in any case.
BTW do any of the list members have comments/criticisms on bech's work?
best,
Michael J. Murphy
Graduate Student, Dept. of Art History and Archaeology
Washington University, St. Louis
"An infinite mirror would no longer be a mirror" -Jean-Louis Baudry
___________________________________________________________________
From: JNKATZ1@aol.com
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 17:50:14 EDT
Subject: Red as dress code
I recall that the main character in Thomas Mann's "Death in Venice" wears a
red necktie.
Good luck in your research. Jonathan Ned Katz
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 18:34:52 -0400
From: denorchiar <denorchiar@gborocollege.edu>
Subject: Posting a Question
Hi,
I'm in the process of finishing up my research paper and had one more question
that you maybe able to help me with.
Recently during one of my classes we discussed pornography and the different
views that we had on it. One person in the class mentioned that they feel
pornography leads when to commit violent acts against women.
How do you all feel about this statement and do you agree or disagree?
Thank you for helping me out!
Rachel DeNorchia
___________________________________________________________________
From: The Fawcett Library <fawcett@lgu.ac.uk>
Subject: Pornography ...
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 11:31:39 +0100 (British Summer Time)
On Wed, 21 Apr 1999 18:34:52 -0400 denorchiar
<denorchiar@gborocollege.edu> wrote:
> Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
> > Hi,
> I'm in the process of finishing up my research paper and had one more question
> that you maybe able to help me with.
> > Recently during one of my classes we discussed pornography and the different
> views that we had on it. One person in the class mentioned that they feel
> pornography leads when to commit violent acts against women.
> > How do you all feel about this statement and do you agree or disagree?
> Thank you for helping me out!
> Rachel DeNorchia
This is a complicated one, and one on which a number of
conflicting assertions (based on equally conflicting
evidence) are regularly made - we can supply details of
numerous publications if needed!
One problem I regularly have with this is the matter of
definition. I am old enough to remember when "pornography"
meant a glimpse of pubic hair, or the works of D.H.
Lawrence, and while the term has shifted its meaning
somewhat away from that, it remains a remarkably elastic
term: if one expresses disapproval of videos of bestial
rape and "snuff" movies, one can find oneself cited as
supporting the indictment of Sally Mann on charges of
sexually abusing her own children (and vice versa: not
supporting said indictment can lead to charges of being in
favour of having donkeys sodomise little girls). One of
the difficulties here is that most of the discussion of
pornography is undertaken from a given political position
who are only interested in "evidence" that supports their
own side.
Or, to put it more simply: I don't know.
David Doughan, Reference Librarian
The Fawcett Library (The National Library of Women)
fawcett@lgu.ac.uk
http://www.lgu.ac.uk/fawcett/main.htm
Phone: 0171 320 1189
Fax: 0171 320 1188
_________________
"If a woman has to choose between catching
a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will
choose to save the infant without even considering
whether there's a man on base." [attrib. to Dave Barry]
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 08:53:19 -0400 (EDT)
From: Sheila Mcmanus <smcmanus@YorkU.CA>
Subject: Re: Posting a Question
On Wed, 21 Apr 1999, denorchiar wrote:
> Recently during one of my classes we discussed pornography and the different
> views that we had on it. One person in the class mentioned that they feel
> pornography leads when to commit violent acts against women.
> How do you all feel about this statement and do you agree or disagree?
Hi Rachel,
I completely disagree with this statement. David Doughan has already
pointed out the huge problems with definition this debate wrestles with:
i.e. what, precisely, is "pornography"? Are we talking videos,
magazine, fiction, or still photography? Where, exactly, is the dividing
line between my "erotica" and your "pornography"? And as the 'Bad
Attitude' trial in Canada demonstrated, to what extent does the definition
rest with who is doing the watching and what is being portrayed? Are
heterosexual snuff films and lesbian SM videos/stories the same thing?
And if they are and if MacKinnon's logic holds, then there should be a
whole lot of lesbians running around raping and beating women. But there
aren't.
Beyond that, my main objections to statements like "pornography makes men
rape/beat women" are as follows:
1) it takes responsibility away from men who choose to rape and beat women
and children;
2) it fails to explain the behaviour of men who rape and beat women and
children without having seen any porn in their lives (i.e. pre-twentieth
century, cultures who do not have North America's highly-developed porn
industry, etc);
3) it fails to explain the behaviour of men who do watch/purchase a lot of
porn without ever raping or beating women and children.
4) it sets up a false dichotomy between "good" sex - soft, fuzzy,
heterosexual, egalitarian, missionary-position-in-the-dark; and "bad" sex
- non-heterosexual, explicit, "violent", etc, without ever deconstructing
all the false binaries the dichotomy rests on; and
5) it focuses on a symptom ("pornography") instead of on the root power
structures: men rape and beat women and children because their behaviour
is sanctioned by patriarchal, heterosexist cultures, not because they
watched a movie or read a magazine.
So there's my rant for a Wednesday morning!
* * * * * * * * *
Sheila McManus
PhD Candidate, Department of History, York University, Toronto, Canada
email: smcmanus@yorku.ca
Dilbert's Laws of Work: Anyone can do any amount of work
provided it isn't the work she is supposed to be doing.
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 12:50:00 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: Social constructionism and homosexuality once more.
This will be a long posting, but I need it because my purpose, as some of
you might have understood, is deconstructing the social constructionist
agenda as a discourse in itself, and therefore no truer than the discourses
it purportedly de-constructs.
What I want to stress it that for 15 years historical research on
pre-modern homosexuality (my field of research) has been wounded almost to
death by the constructionist dogma: all that was published either come from
an anti-constructionist (which by the way does NOT mean "essentialist")
point of view, or merely re-used documents made available from
anti-constructionists to garb them in an obscure lingo to "demonstrate"
that before 1869 no such a thing as homosexuality existed, therefore the
documents just cited did not deal with homosexuality at all. That is to
say: works that did not add any new, fresh knowledge, but just
re-interpreted in other words what was known already... denying we knew it
at all after all.
Until now I did not name any names: I see no reasons why I should take the
risk to make enemies among members of this list, while I found out through
the years that people who share the point of view I fight against are, as
human beings, helpful, concerned, serious researchers. In my case, by the
way, the first idea to start a gay history research in Italy come to me
from one of constructionists' bibles, _Coming out_ by Jeffrey Weeks, and
several more books from constructionists writers are among my favourite ones.
Yet I realise I cannot keep talking in general, so one name I shall make:
David Halperin. In his book _One hundred years of homosexuality_, devoted
to same-sex sex in Classical Greece, he assumes from the title on that
homosexuality did not exist in ancient times, because it is a historical
construction, dating EXACTLY 100 years (hence the title). The marking
point, in truly imperialist anglo-centric fashion, was not even the
invention of the word "homosexualitaet" by a German-speaking Hungarian
homosexual (as it was), but the later entrance of this word in an English
dictionary by means of an obscure and forgotten UK doctor. Fabulous: this
is how social construcitonsim works, honey.
Yet, after painstakingly reading through his book, the reader reaches page
76 where schizophrenia strikes. Here Halperin is discussing about
friendship in Classical Greece, uttering: "a somewhat more loosely defined
modern concept called "friendship" which I am treating, for heuristic
purposes only, as if it were a valid and universally applicable
sociological category (which, of course, it isn't" and so on.
I could not believe my eyes. This is the same Halperin that at page 164
(footnote 67) warns (correctly) that even the word "penis", if used dealing
with the ancient world, brings with itself socially constructed
un-legitimate modern implication. Yet he uses unproblematically through the
whole book some of the most socially constructed words ever invented by the
human race: "male" and "female", "man" and "woman". For heuristic purposes
only, I bet.
Well, while at doubt about the direct relevance of ancient eunuchs on
today's homosexuals, I can but agree on Mark Brustman's interest in them:
after all it was our ancestors who defined eunuchs as a "tertium genus
hominum" "a third sex in humankind", which no serious scholars in XIX
century construction should dismiss so easily as we are doing today.
"Man and "woman" are as socially constructed categories as "homosexual" is,
and even more.
Worse: actually, ANY word is socially constructed. And I have been asking
thrice TO NO AVAIL why should only the word "homosexuality" be
deconstructed, while leaving the rest of the dictionary untapped.
This is a question nobody wants to answer me, it seems. Perhaps just
because no-one has a logical answer to give me.
Well, perhaps I'll get no answers in the future either, but this silence
should be noisier than a blast: why is nobody answering such a simple
query? Is it not that the dogmatic nature of social constructionism comes
to an eye from his unwillingness to discuss its own roots, which would show
the way it is socially constructed itself? I think Norton made a point
noticing that S.C. has roots also in the loss of power experienced by the
Academia in recent times. After all, S.C. puts intelligentsia as the
societal ultimate demiurg. In its latest avatar, post-structuralism - cum -
Derrida, it somewhat posits the historian as the real author of history,
doing without those complicate and stupid things such as "masses"
"economical forces" and so one: words and only words count - discourses,
that is.
Well, Halperin, with his problems with the *word* "friendship", shows the
degree of aphasia waiting for anyone coherently applying social
constructionists axioms (be they either Foucaultian or anti-Foucaultian),
to the point to be coerced to do without S.C. "for heuristic purposes
only". Yet a heuristic theory which is but an impediment in making history
is something I can gladly do without, thanks.
Several people seem to have realised that this is quite what S.C. is: at
best an annoyance, at worst, a severely misleading power discourse. Yet
most seem to be ecology-conscious and in place of plainly trashing it, they
are tying - in my opinion - to recycle it under different guises names and
labels.
Hence the diaspora of approaches based on S.C. trying to "correct" it in a
way or another.
This we could see in postings from the last fifteen days or so, that
represented several points of view.
More than one posting in these days mentioned "two" fields battling in
these days, saying the debate is once more between essentialists and
constructionists. I am glad to say that this is NOT the case at all. At
least FOUR points of view are present in the debate, in fact.
Rictor Norton stands in favour of an "essentialist" point of view. As I
told before, although I share his anti-constructionist point of view very
much, I do not think it is wise his adopting the "essentialist" point of
view, which is not a point of view or a method of analysis in itself, but
just a straw man invented by constructionists to have a fake enemy (in
constructionists' method, an essentialist is anyone they decide to label as
such, i.e. anyone who dares disagree with them. Norton is the first human
being I met who decided to self-label himself this way). Yet Norton might
have his good reasons to fight from that standpoint rather than for another
one: perhaps someone has to have the Ugly Beast come to life for true after
15 years it has been around without ever showing its ugly face, just to
show essentialism is but a straw man.
The second point of view is a moderate nominalist one. Reality exists, yet
we can *only* know it through socially constructed categories. Which do not
create reality "per se", nor have things to came into being: they just give
names and catalogue. This is my point of view, from and
anti-constructionist point of view, and I guess Ivan Crozier also shares it
although from a clearly pro-constructionist point of view (he does not
dismiss away the fact that homosexuality pre-existed the medical
construction in XIX century, only it was interpreted differently).
The third point is a revisionist constructionism, which I guess is the
prevailing attitude, such as the one I read in the postings by Mark
Brustman (who rereads Foucault trying to say heterodox things worded in
orthodox constructionist lingo), Tim Hodgdon (who "begun to think about the
possibility of a new school of the history of sexuality, one grounded in an
explicitly anti-Foucauldian social constructionism", as he said in a
posting), and perhaps David Greenberg (who said: "I count myself as a
social constructionist who disagrees with Foucault on many matters" which
could or could not mean he is "revising": I am uncertain about his stand,
but this is not important at all for the sake of what I am saying here).
I won't make the same mistake that social constructionists daily do, that
is lumping together very different points of view just because they all are
"against" something. After all also the Religious Right thinks
homosexuality is none of an essence: it is an acquired "taste" which is
freely "chosen" by those who "claim" to be homosexuals, whereas there is no
such a thing as a "homosexual", apart from the fact that a person claims to
be such a thing. Although Social constructionism would agree with this
statement, and although I think social constructionism is far more
right-wing than it is open to confess, I would never say that the Religious
right is "social constructionist". That would be ridiculous.
But I am quoting this example just to show that perhaps the stars inside
the Social constructionist galaxy, after the Big Bang, are travelling away
from each other so fast and so afar to make me wondering whether a social
constructionist method or school of thought exists at all.
This is an interesting question, although to me it is not the most urgent
one: I can do fine without an answer.
The fourth one is eventually the orthodox constructionist point of view, we
all know well since it monopolised gaylesbian studies for 15 years, such as
it appears in Katz' mailing denying "ontological" reality to homosexuality.
In this point of view homosexuality is totally a human artefact, created in
its essence by discourses. It makes therefore no sense studying it before
it was "created", full stop.
To tell the truth we have one fifth point of view, that of Bob alone, who
in a typically postmodernist fashion merely snubs through jokes and word
puns any document that does not fit in his categories, criticising other
people's points of views yet never giving evidence about his own one other
than in dogmatic terms ("I think so and so, and even if you prove it is not
so and so, I still think so and so"). This is not a point of view,
actually, just a lack of any points of view, so I did not count it at the
beginning: jokes are for parties, not for serious historical research.
Bob might be convinced as he is that no such a thing as truth exists: he
may be right in that our minds cannot reach any "absolute" truth (but do
absolutes exists? I do not believe so), but this does not mean that
reaching at least a RELATIVE truth must remain the goal of any serious
scholar, unattainable as it is.
After all, his point of view is no new: in my high school memories I have
Gorgias saying that truth cannot be known and if it can, it can't be
communicated to third parts anyway, so we do not have any truth, just
"doxa", i.e. opinions. Well, even if every truth were a mere doxa - a word
mentioned in a recent posting - then we should have some unsubstantiated
doxas and some substantiated ones, that is to say, we should have again the
dichotomy between "true" (substantiated) and "false" (unsubstantiated).
Put in other words, the dichotomy still stands. So I don't see any cogent
reason to change the traditional although not very precise terms just to be
"à la mode" in the latest version of Academic lingoes: this is something
suitable for members of a religious sect (which very often
post-structuralists are), not for researchers in the field of human history
and/or sexuality.
The recurring question of the "essential truth" might be made clearer by
thinking about another social construction many of us know from near of
even from within: Aids.
Aids was "discovered" as a nosological entity in 1981 not because it was
born that year, but only because human (scientific) knowledge was not
"ready" earlier to put together several separate symptoms that until there
existed yet had just puzzled doctors. Discovery, just a few years before,
of how retroviruses work in human bodies, made it possible to have a model
to understand how a retrovirus/lentivirus (be it Hiv or another one) could
work and be spread.
Yet the virus had been around for decades. Blood samples stored in
refrigerators for future analysis revealed that Hiv+ antibodies were
present in blood samples of people who had died of "mysterious" illness
since refrigerators to store blood samples were adopted by Western
hospitals. And everybody had known that Kaposi Sarcoma had been rampant
among East Africans for long. And so on.
Does this mean that Aids is a "socially constructed" illness? Prof.
Duesberg says it is, that actually homosexuality "per se" and drug abuse
"cause" Aids, not Hiv. But in my humble opinion I saw too many gay friends
of mine taking advantage from tri-therapies against Hiv not to think that
the Hiv theory makes (at least some) sense. Yes, in the scientific field
everything is true just as far it is not proved false. But Hiv is a
"reality". Anyone who thinks it is *just another social construction* may
just fuck around without a condom to test in a very scientific way his/her
opinion. Just let me know about the results in a few years, thanks. Maybe
s/he will have changed his/her mind about it -- as well as serological
status, of course.
What is good in extremist nominalism is that eventually it kills the bearer
of this theory, who cannot convince him/herself reality counts fo real. We
may not know for sure what Reality is, we may know it just through socially
constructed schemata, yet reality counts. In the real world (not in the
Ivory tower of the academic one, though) you can't just explain it away.
OK, I think I wrote enough and I'll stop here. Of course it won't be
neither me nor my postings to solve the debate. Yet my contributing to it
here won't harm anybody.
To sum up for those who had the patience to read through until here and who
may wonder what I was doing; what I am doing is trying to de-construct the
alleged "debate" among constructionists and essentialist. *I wanted to show
that we do not have two fields, but more*: opinions are by now much more
nuanced than constructionists claim in their usual dichotomy
"Constructionism versus essentialism" as if it were Light versus darkness.
Perhaps I am just poking at what everybody by now understood, i.e. that the
traditional and strictly orthodox Social constructionist approach "à la"
Halperin is a dead end. Yet I would like to make another point: Whereas in
modern history S.C. may have given interesting results in the very limited
field of the XIXth century medical discourse about homosexuality, in every
other fields it left things as they were. Therefore it should not be
"recycled", as I see many people are trying to do, but should be discarded
altogether instead.
I know this is a personal and private opinion, yet this is my opinion :)
I think attention should be paid to pre-modern homosexualities and to
non-western homosexuality, abandoning once for all the snub and
ethno-centric assumption, upon which Social constructionism stands, that
anything that is not what Anglo-Saxons call "homosexuality" is not REAL
homosexuality, and MUST be a discrete phenomenon, separate by so-called
epistemological breaks.
And, yes, through this posting I wanted to insist that a deconstruction of
social constructionism is badly needed. Who are constructionists? What's
the political meaning of they effort, in social/sociological terms? Not the
one they claim, of course, but the one that can be observed from outside
their field, that is to say, Anglo-Saxon Academia. Why is it such an almost
exclusively Anglo-Saxon phenomenon? How does it respond to needs and fears
that are typical of the Anglo-Saxon world alone? And whence these needs stem?
In short: why American Academia needed S.C. in the first place?
Tese are intriguing questions, I think. Anyone interested in giving me an
answer?
Gayest greetings
Giovanni Dall'Orto - Milano (Italy)
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1999 00:54:14 +1000
From: Belinda Morris <bmorris@deakin.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Posting a Question
I agree with a lot of what Sheila says, in that blaming pornography ignores
a lot of the larger issues, and removes some of the responsibility from men
who commit violence against women. however, i also believe there is a very
strong correlation between pornography and some acts of violence against
women. there have been cases where men have seen pornography, and have
then raped women, in an almost exact re-enactment of what they have seen.
Perhaps it wasn't the pornography which 'made' them do it, but it obviously
gave them ideas and showed them how!
i think there is also a very strong connection, in that pornography
portrays women as sexual objects, available for men's pleasure, which
inevitably leads to them being treated as such. and of course all this is
after the violence which has been inflicted on the women IN the movies in
the first place! just because it's being filmed or photographed, doesn't
lessen the pain they experience.
OK, so that was my Thursday night rant!
Belinda
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 10:14:35 -0700 (MST)
From: Tim Hodgdon <Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu>
Subject: Ms Denochiar's question about pornography
Dear Ms Denochiar
As you'll see, this question provokes sharply divergent responses among
members of the list, partly because it has recently been fought over in
law and politics, and the dust has not yet settled.
Ms McManus described her post as a "rant"; well, it was, but it was also
a very clear exposition of opposition to the perspective put forward in
1982 by Catharine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin, then consultants to the
Minneapolis city council. I'm going to structure this post as a
response to McManus, hoping that this clarifies the nature of this
heated debate.
In their proposed ordinance, MacKinnon and Dworkin proposed to redefine
pornography as a political practice that subordinated women as a
sex-class to men. This distinguishes their work from the moralist
definition of pornography developed over the centuries by men who
defined it as obscenity, a violation of Christian morality (never mind
that these same men found obscenity all the more erotically satisfying
for having forced it underground). The M/D proposal redefined
pornography as a violation of women's **civil** rights, where obscenity
law defines it as a crime, prosecutable at the discretion of the state.
Even as they recognized the fact that the courts are hostile to feminist
claims for women's equality, M and D tried to create a means of legal
recourse for ordinary women harmed by pornography.
The theory underlying the ordinance was that pornography is a form of
speech **and conduct** that enforces gender hierarchy at the expense of
women's human rights. They argue that gender is not, and can never be
reformed to be, a relationship of equality between complementary but
different equals. Another way to put it is that gender is not a natural
phenomenon reducible to principles of "yin" and "yang": it is a socially
constructed system of masculine domination that must be overthrown.
Since there is, in nature, nothing that corresponds to our cultural
conceptions of human masculine and feminine, these categories must be
imposed through constant repetition and reiteration in order to appear
"natural." Pornography plays a crucial role in maintaining this system
of domination through its constant equation of sexual pleasure with
masculine dominance and feminine submission. This is, in M and D's
view, more than just "speech," though ideas are involved: pornography
for men is literally a sexual experience, sometimes through
masturbation, but always by reassuring the masculine viewer that he is
superior because *what is being done to the effeminized sex object in
the words or pictures is not being done to someone "like" himself.* Of
course, the effeminized object may be genitally male; the masculinized
image in pornography may be genitally female; and some women, including
lesbian sadomasochists, may experience pornography as erotic because it
is so charged with sexual meanings depending on difference. In M and
D's view, this does not negate the fact that in order for some women to
derive erotic satisfaction from pornography, many more must remain
subordinated to men in their daily lives, and in the making of
pornography itself, for relations of dominance and subordination to feel
sexy. M and D aimed to create a legal means by which women could hold
men legally accountable for the harms that come from being subordinated
in and through pornography.
In creating a civil cause of action, M and D defined pornography in
legal terms as "the graphic, sexually explicit subordination of women
through pictures or words." This answers McManus' question about which
media are involved: any and all.
McManus' argues that as a practical matter, who does the judging makes a
difference in how such a civil-rights law is applied. This is a good
point, and one that MacKinnon, an attorney and law professor, and
Dworkin, a political activist and writer, appreciate through bitter
personal experience. They know that the state defends masculine
interests, but they see no alternative to confronting the masculinist
state through law as well as activism. To wait for a feminist judiciary
is to wait until after the revolution to do something practical about
injustice in the here and now. One point that is frequently overlooked
about their proposed ordinance is that it was intended not only as a
form of legal redress, but also as a focal point for direct action on
the street. Law alone, they believed, was not enough; activism alone,
with no legal leverage against wealthy pornographers who owned the means
of "free" speech, also was not enough.
The rest of McManus' post revolves around the meaning of causation.
What does it mean to say that pornography "causes" men to rape, batter,
prostitute, and objectify women? McManus' arguments depend on a very
straightforward form of causation: a single-variable cause leading to
predictable effect. She argues that, because one cannot demonstrate
reflexive cause-and-effect, then pornography should be understood as a
symptom of male supremacy, not one of its root causes.
But this is not the only possible meaning of causation, as historians
and social scientists well know. M and D argue that pornography is one
powerful root cause of women's social subordination precisely because it
affords men a wide range of possibilities for participation in and
enjoying their privileges as the dominant sex-class. For a great many
men, pornography is convenient because they themselves don't have to get
their hands bloody: the sex industry coerces women into complying with
nice guys' need to confirm their manhood over and against an effeminized
body in exchange for cash: a quarter dropped into a peepshow slot helps
a nice guy reify his manhood without having to raise his hand against a
woman. But pornography's constant linkage of eroticism with domination
also serves as encouragement and justification for men who want to live
a little more "dangerously." This is not a simple case of "monkey see,
monkey do": men can and do objectify women without the aid of
pornography, and thus, men who are not porn users can easily enough find
encouragement and justification for sexual aggression. But to say that
therefore porn is just a symptom misses its power as a mass medium: it
represents a massive escalation of--an industrialization of--the sexual
legitimation of manhood.
This industrialization is a modern phenomenon, and it has prompted two
kinds of resistance, from fundamentalists on the one hand and feminist
antipornography activists on the other, which are often misunderstood
(that is, conflated) as two versions of the same thing. Fundamentalists
say they hate the pornographers: they are hypocrites when they deny
their keen enjoyment of women as sex objects (as Jimmy Swaggert's
exploitation of prostitutes well demonstrates). What the fundies really
object to is the modern *means* of subordinating women: they have a lot
invested in the old-fashioned cottage industry of legitimizing manhood
one woman at a time within the Christian family, and they see the
industrialization of the process as risky, as exposing the means and
ends of male supremacy to public scrutiny and organized political
resistance. These are real risks--witness feminist antipornography
activism--but pornographers and a generation of sexual liberals look at
the potential rewards. In a society saturated with pornography, feminist
resistance to sexual objectification and sexual aggression appears
increasingly quaint, Luddite, or "Victorian" and "anti-sex." McManus'
characterization of anti-pornography activists' conception of "'good'
sex" as "soft, fuzzy, heterosexual, egalitarian, missionary-position-in-
the-dark" arises from principle, and not from "false consciousness"; but
I believe that she is incorrect. Feminist antipornography activism does
envision the possibility of an eroticism not linked to the dynamics of
dominance and submission celebrated by pornography, but that eroticism
cannot be said to be heterosexual, since heterosexuality is one form of
the eroticism of dominance and submission. We have no name for that
eroticism yet, since it is a very rare experience
Tim Hodgdon
Ph.D. candidate
Teaching Associate
Department of History
Arizona State University
Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 15:35:55 -0400 (EDT)
From: "David F. Greenberg" <dg4@is3.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: Social constructionism and homosexuality once more.
Giovanni Dall'Orto's response is too long to quote in full, and I don't
have the time to do so; instead I'll just respond to just one point.
Giovanni asks why other concepts besides homosexuality are not
deconstructed. The observation that all concepts are socially constructed
is certainly true, but the assumption in his question is false. One can
find books and articles demonstrating the social construction of race and
sex, for example. One doesn't constantly engage in such exercizes every
time one speaks or writes; if one tried, speech would be impossible. One
does this to make particular points. Giovanni's point has been made
before, and answered before; perhaps one reason no one responds to his
point is that it becomes boring to make the same points over and over
again. One gets the sense that the people raising the issue are not really
interested in it, but are only engaging in rhetorical exercizes. - David
Greenberg
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 16:17:04 -0400
From: Leah Himmelhoch <lhimmelhoch@mail.wesleyan.edu>
Subject: Posing a question
I, too, agree with Sheila McManus; the question of what constitutes
'pornography' is almost always politicized on some level. Pornography is a
fluid construct. I do also believe that blaming pornography for violent
behavior subtly shifts the responsibility for violence away from the
perpetrator, and somehow makes him or her a blameless, passive 'vessel'
through which some alien, evil influence acted. My reasons for even
writing this note, however, lie with Belinda Morris' posting:
>I agree with a lot of what Sheila says, in that blaming pornography ignores
>a lot of the larger issues, and removes some of the responsibility from men
>who commit violence against women. however, i also believe there is a very
>strong correlation between pornography and some acts of violence against
>women. there have been cases where men have seen pornography, and have
>then raped women, in an almost exact re-enactment of what they have seen.
>Perhaps it wasn't the pornography which 'made' them do it, but it obviously
>gave them ideas and showed them how!
My response: Although it is true that some men have committed crimes that
practically re-enact pornographic scenes, this strikes me as being evidence
of a lack of originality on the part of the criminal, and not so much as
being evidence that pornography itself engenders violence. The seed of
violent behavior was already present in these individuals, and it is likely
that they would have committed a violent crime without the presence of
pornography. Hence, that they copied some scene from a pornographic video
or magazine demonstrates that they are both vicious and unoriginal, not
that they would otherwise have been sterling citizens had they not gotten a
'how to' lesson from their pornographic sources. Furthermore, I would not
be surprised if the reason why so many of these criminals were as
'influenced' by pornography as they were, is that these are the sorts of
men who were unable to deal well with women in the first place. Hence,
that they originally showered so much attention upon pornographic items is
also a symptom, and not a cause, of their underlying problems. This is not
to say that all persons who spend a great deal of time with pornography are
necessarily maladjusted, I am merely saying that, of those *criminals* for
whom pornography played a signal part of their criminal activity, this
could well be the case.
>i think there is also a very strong connection, in that pornography
>portrays women as sexual objects, available for men's pleasure, which
>inevitably leads to them being treated as such. and of course all this is
>after the violence which has been inflicted on the women IN the movies in
>the first place! just because it's being filmed or photographed, doesn't
>lessen the pain they experience.
I think we have a 'chicken and egg' proposition here. Which came first,
the patriarchal culture that objectifies women so that, as a result, its
pornography perpetuates that objectification, or the objectifying
pornography that gave men the idea that women exist solely as objects?
Although there is no clear answer to either of these questions (since
culture pre-exists us even as we confirm, perpetuate, and re-create its
values), again, I think that, for the most part, pornography is not the
cause of male objectification of women. That a great deal of pornography
DOES objectify women is, I think, more a manifestation of a pre-existing
cultural practice. Therefore, to eliminate pornography is to address a
symptom, not a cause (assuming, of course, that we can even agree upon what
is 'pornographic', and what is not). When I say this, however, I do not
mean to demean or diminish the suffering and damage that have resulted from
the treatment of women in violent films or pornography. I am merely
addressing the question whether pornography is the ultimate source of the
male objectification of women.
So, I guess you could say that I think pornography is not a problem per se,
but rather, I think that pornography is a cultural product (again, this
gets us into another problem about culture and its perpetuation, but I'll
save that for another time). This is, of course, assuming we can even
agree upon what constitutes pornography. As Sheila McManus has already
stated, pornography (as distinguished from 'erotica') often seems to be
whatever is unpopular with the speaker.
Cheers,
Leah Himmelhoch
Visiting Assistant Professor
Department of Classical Studies
Wesleyan University
Middletown, CT 06457
Off.#/FAX: (860) 685-2082/2089
lhimmelhoch@wesleyan.edu
___________________________________________________________________
From: MillerJimE@aol.com
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 20:43:34 EDT
Subject: Re: Ms Denochiar's question about pornography
If in legal materials we define porn in terms of subordinating women
to men sexually, how does this apply (or does it apply) to all-male gay porn?
Can heavy SM gay porn be touched by such a law? What about pseudo-lesbian
porn produced for heterosexual male consumption, some of which relies on
violent images? I know the theoretical ways in which such porn can be
construed within the framework of violence against women by men . . . etc,
etc. BUT, how do you make this work in the courtroom when applying such
laws? I would not trust a judge or lawyer with socio-literary constructions
of misogyny in same-sex porn.
Jim Miller
In a message dated 04/22/1999 1:11:09 PM Central Daylight Time,
Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu writes:
<< In their proposed ordinance, MacKinnon and Dworkin proposed to redefine
pornography as a political practice that subordinated women as a
sex-class to men. This distinguishes their work from the moralist
definition of pornography developed over the centuries by men who
defined it as obscenity, a violation of Christian morality (never mind
that these same men found obscenity all the more erotically satisfying
for having forced it underground). The M/D proposal redefined
pornography as a violation of women's **civil** rights, where obscenity
law defines it as a crime, prosecutable at the discretion of the state. >>
___________________________________________________________________
From: MillerJimE@aol.com
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 20:31:55 EDT
Subject: Re: Posting a Question
Rachel inquired,
>> Recently during one of my classes we discussed pornography and the
different
>> views that we had on it. One person in the class mentioned that they feel
>> pornography leads when to commit violent acts against women.
>> How do you all feel about this statement and do you agree or disagree?
Porn interacts with the individual viewer and his/her culture. A
person with a strong propensity toward violence may find the mildest porn
inciting him (or her?) to direct that violence toward a live object of lust.
In other contexts without the porn the violent person might act out against
non-sexual objects (e.g. fights in a bar, or just kicking the dog). On the
other hand someone with far less violent tendency would require a certain
level of violence in the porn to push him over the edge. Meanwhile most
viewers of porn belong in the coutch potato category -- they may thoroughly
enjoy even heavy, graphic vioence in their porn (and in their non-porn
entertainment as well) without ever feeling tempted to expend their own
energy in violence.
And then the degree of acceptance or approval in the culture for
sexual violence (e.g. locker room talk) plays a role in what percentage of
the potentially violent will actually practice violence.
Sheila M replied, > . . . Are
>heterosexual snuff films and lesbian SM videos/stories the same thing?
>And if they are and if MacKinnon's logic holds, then there should be a
>whole lot of lesbians running around raping and beating women. But there
>aren't.
But are there at least a few? And is porn one of the things which
incites them? Do we have answers for these questions?
>1) it takes responsibility away from men who choose to rape and beat women
>and children;
>2) it fails to explain the behaviour of men who rape and beat women and
>children without having seen any porn in their lives (i.e. pre-twentieth
>century, cultures who do not have North America's highly-developed porn
>industry, etc);
>3) it fails to explain the behaviour of men who do watch/purchase a lot of
>porn without ever raping or beating women and children.
>4) it sets up a false dichotomy between "good" sex - soft, fuzzy,
>heterosexual, egalitarian, missionary-position-in-the-dark; and "bad" sex
>- non-heterosexual, explicit, "violent", etc, without ever deconstructing
>all the false binaries the dichotomy rests on; and
>5) it focuses on a symptom ("pornography") instead of on the root power
>structures: men rape and beat women and children because their behaviour
>is sanctioned by patriarchal, heterosexist cultures, not because they
>watched a movie or read a magazine.
I agree on the responsibility part, but porn must be seen as one of several
variables. The question is not whether porn works like a coin in a vending
machine. The question is whether it has an effect in raising (or lowering?)
rates of sexual violence in the larger population of porn consumers. This
should not be an all-or-nothing question.
Jim Miller
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1999 11:16:55 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: Re: Ms Denochiar's question about pornography
In 10.14 22/04/99 -0700, Tim Hdgdon wrote:
>Dear Ms Denochiar
& re.
I really appreciated seeing a man teaching a woman how she should think if
she wants to be a "good", _really_ feminist woman.
It does not sound new at all, especially when this teaching passes through
laws enforced to protet these frail, powerless creatures, but sure being
gallant to them is the white man's burden, idn'it?
Giovanni Dall'Orto - Milano (Italy).
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1999 13:09:13 +0100
From: Ianthe <ianthe@duende.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Ms Denochiar's question about pornography
In message <31538391.24511c36@aol.com>, MillerJimE@aol.com writes
>Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
Re: porn debate.
Why is this warmed-over and utterly predictable
'debate' taking place on a historical discussion
list ?
So far it has given no arguments that Ms Denochiar
couldn't easily get from a quick flick through the
potted overviews of the 1980s 'Porn Wars' which
are available in most University libraries or are
to be found on the Web. That is why they were written
- so people wouldn't have to be bored rigid by
repeating all the old arguments to people who weren't
around at the time. Still less has this 'debate'
given any new experiences or any specific historial
comment or material, and doesn't look as though it's
likely to do so.
An informed discussion of parallels and differences
between the impact on the growth and standing of
the medium of photography in relation to the vast
1890s industry in 'nude postcards', and the modern-day
reactions to the 1990s 'net porn' boom - examining
ideas about how these panics may allow moral reformers
to mount covert attacks on _queer_ uses of the new media
-- now _that_ might be interesting.
Yours,
--
Ianthe Duende
___________________________________________________________________
From: The Fawcett Library <fawcett@lgu.ac.uk>
Subject: Pornography/Representing violence
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1999 12:52:21 +0100 (British Summer Time)
These debates seldom seem to move outside the area of
sexuality, which is interesting. If representation
can be assumed to influence behaviour, cannot the same be
said for non-sexual violence? It may surely be argued that
the constant depiction of fictionalised violence on TV and
films bears some responsibility for the Trench-Coat Mafia,
to say nothing of politicians whose answer to everything
seems to be the bomb. How about legislation that would
allow, say, victims of street violence, or Serbs, or
Albanians, to sue in civil courts the makers / distributors
/ broadcasters of such programmes / films as _The Great
Escape_, or _Dirty Harry_, or _Terminator_, or _Reservoir
Dogs_?
Or is it really just about sex?
David Doughan, Reference Librarian
The Fawcett Library (The National Library of Women)
fawcett@lgu.ac.uk
http://www.lgu.ac.uk/fawcett/main.htm
Phone: 0171 320 1189
Fax: 0171 320 1188
_________________
"If a woman has to choose between catching
a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will
choose to save the infant without even considering
whether there's a man on base." [attrib. to Dave Barry]
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1999 10:31:03 -0700 (MST)
From: Tim Hodgdon <Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu>
Subject: Re: Pornography/Representing violence (brief)
Jim Miller asked: "how do you make this [civil-rights antipornography
legislation] work in the courtroom when applying such laws? I would not
trust a judge or lawyer with socio-literary constructions of misogyny in
same-sex porn." Remember that this is a civil law: a suit can only be
initiated by a member of the defined subordinated class (in the cases
Miller asks about, a man, child, or transsexual) subordinated in the
same ways that women are subordinated, according to the definitions in
the ordinance. The plaintiff is saying that the pornography (or the
making of the pornography *harmed him.* A plaintiff would have to find
an attorney whom he could trust--I'm not an attorney, so I don't know if
a civil-rights plaintiff can represent himself; I assume not. Neither
the gay/transsexual plaintiff would have to trust the judge, although
judges do have a lot to say about how the trial goes: plaintiffs would
have to place their faith in the jury. As imperfect as it is, this
legislation might well do subordinated parties some good.
David Doughan, in a separate posting, asks:
> "How about legislation that would
> allow, say, victims of street violence, or Serbs, or
> Albanians, to sue in civil courts the makers / distributors
> / broadcasters of such programmes / films as _The Great
> Escape_, or _Dirty Harry_, or _Terminator_, or _Reservoir
> Dogs_?"
Remember that the MacKinnon/Dworkin ordinance was a **civil-rights**
ordinance. It is designed to members of systematically subordinated
**classes** (defined in the ordinance) redress to the courts to hold
their oppressors accountable for violating their civil rights. In this
regard, we already have parallel legislation in force: that part of sex
discrimination law which holds individuals and corporations accountable
for the creation of a sexually hostile work environment.
Last, but not least, it is my belief that these sorts of "potted
debates" occur on the list because they relate directly to the history
that we write. Historians create a usable past for audiences in the
present; and while, like all threads, this one deserves only its share
of attention, and should not be endlessly belabored, I do believe that
it contributes something very useful.
Tim Hodgdon
Ph.D. candidate
Teaching Associate
Department of History
Arizona State University
Tim.Hodgdon@asu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
Subject: Re: Ms Denochiar's question about pornography
Date: Sat, 24 Apr 1999 22:39:31 -0500
From: "Michael J. Murphy" <mjmurphy@artsci.wustl.edu>
Ianthe brings up an interesting point. We speak of porn (however we
define it in our heads, groins, laws) as though it has no history. In
fact, and as Charles Baudelaire noted, unacceptable sexual images were
part of photography from almost its very beginning. During France's
Second Empire illicit imagery represented a major section of the
commercial photography industry despite numerous laws, seizures and
imprisonments. Today, two of the best archives to study porn are the
Paris Police Museum and the Biblitheque Nationale (Paris). Incidentally
France becomes associated with the production of salacious visual and
other sexual materials because, although it was at times illegal to
produce and sell these items in France, it was not if they were intended
for export.
Of course, one of the major differences in 19th century photographic and
stereographic porn, and today's internet porn is its materiality, or lack
thereof. If the internet alters the syndication, distribution,
exhibition, and reception of photographic porn, the advent of the digital
camera means that the internet pornographic image, in the literal meaning
of porno-graphic, never really exists. In fact, photography's claim to
status as an index of the real is seriously undermined when it is
transformed into bits and bytes. Witness the diminishing cultural
authority of the photograph as disinterested record, which of course it
never was but was widely believed as having. (I think of this as the
Forrest Gump syndrome.) Although its new immateriality and
insubstantiality perhaps enhances its status as a commodity, and perhaps
therefore its efficacy for titillation.
I think queer porn on the internet is a great deal less threatened by
bible thumping moral reformists than the increasing commercialization of
the net.
Just some musings....
Ianthe Duende wrote:
>An informed discussion of parallels and differences
>between the impact on the growth and standing of
>the medium of photography in relation to the vast
>1890s industry in 'nude postcards', and the modern-day
>reactions to the 1990s 'net porn' boom - examining
>ideas about how these panics may allow moral reformers
>to mount covert attacks on _queer_ uses of the new media
>-- now _that_ might be interesting.
Michael J. Murphy
Graduate Student, Dept. of Art History and Archaeology
Washington University, St. Louis
"I've always depended on the kindness of strangers." -Blanche Dubois
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Social constructionism and homosexuality once more.
Date: Sun, 25 Apr 1999 09:45:12 +0100
Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
Giovanni Dall'Orto notes that the "essentialist" point of view "is not a
point of view or a method of analysis in itself, but just a straw man
invented by constructionists to have a fake enemy". It is quite true that in
many cases the creature called "an essentialist" is a gross caricature
created (constructed!) by social constructionists, especially in the fields
of gay and lesbian theory and feminist theory, whenever they want to
demolish a view opposed to theirs. They usually ascribe some of the more
naive stereotypes to "essentialists" such as saying we believe that "all
homosexuals are essentially artistic" etc. Very often, especially during the
rise of Queer Theory, "essentialist" simply became an epithet used to
stigmatize those who questioned The Revealed Truth of radical social
constructionism. Very few people call themselves essentialist: they call
themselves realists.
But essentialism does exist as a point of view, and often it is linked to
particular theories or methods of analysis -- e.g. empiricism. The word
"essentialist", as currently used, originates in Marxist philosophical
discourse, and is used to characterise any view that accounts for behaviour
and change in some kind of fundamental ground other than economics and
cultural materialism. The term "essentialist" is still used extensively in
high-level Marxist philosophy, which often wrestles with the apparent
essentialism of economic determinism. In our field, accounting for sexual
behaviour by reference to a "sex drive" is essentialist, while accounting
for it by reference to "surplus capital" is materialist. Or a less
simplistic example, saying that non-Western male sex workers are motivated
by a desire to use payment and gift exchange as a way of covering their gay
desires and avoiding stigma as queers, is an essentialist view, while saying
that they are driven primarily by the "cash nexus" is a materialist view. Of
course a combination of things
motivate male sex workers, but you will use value-laden words like "crucial"
or "primary" depending on what your point of view is. The fact of the matter
is that basically opposing viewpoints exist, and it's quite proper (not
merely "straw mannish") to use the opposing terms "essentialist" and
"constructionist" in discussing such views. OK, so it isn't just a binary
dichotomy, and there are nuanced positions of weak nominalism and
revisionist constructionism -- but these are still positions along a scale
that points in two opposite directions.
These terms have entered our vocabulary as convenient short-hand terms, and
it's too late in the day to try to escape them. Of course often the term
"essentialist" is used unthinkingly and it can blind people to the merits of
our opposing view, and perhaps that's why Dall'Orto thinks it's "unwise" of
me to label myself an essentialist. But I don't mind being called the Ugly
Beast. My strategy for labelling myself essentialist should be transparent.
I'm here -- I'm queer/essentialist -- you better get used to it!
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Tue, 27 Apr 1999 23:01:42 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: Social constructionism and homosexuality and "rhetorical
exercizes"
In 15.35 22/04/99 -0400, David Greenberg wrote:
>Giovanni Dall'Orto's response is too long to quote in full, and I don't
>have the time to do so; instead I'll just respond to just one point.
>Giovanni asks why other concepts besides homosexuality are not
>deconstructed. The observation that all concepts are socially constructed
>is certainly true, but the assumption in his question is false. One can
>find books and articles demonstrating the social construction of race and
>sex, for example. One doesn't constantly engage in such exercizes every
>time one speaks or writes; if one tried, speech would be impossible. One
>does this to make particular points. Giovanni's point has been made
>before, and answered before; perhaps one reason no one responds to his
>point is that it becomes boring to make the same points over and over
>again. One gets the sense that the people raising the issue are not really
>interested in it, but are only engaging in rhetorical exercizes. - David
>Greenberg
Dear David Greenberg,
thank you for your note. Of course I was not expecting to get an answer to
the whole of my posting, which was long indeed.
However, my question was not why "other concepts besides homosexuality are
not deconstructed", since I know very well, as everybody else knows it,
that certain concepts (such as race) have been deconstructed already as well.
My question was in fact: why are they not deconstructed as well WHILE
DECONSTRUCTING HOMOSEXUALITY.
It is not methodologically correct analysing how homosexuality was socially
constructed while not doing the same at once with the rest of our socially
constructed mentalities. Doing so - even for "heuristic reasons only" as
Halperin does - means dealing with other concepts as if they were
essentially true in themselves, which denies the very point in social
deconstructionism and comes to my point of view on the matter (that there
are indeed some "given data", that are interpreted differently by each
generation and/or social group, but maintain the same "essence", if you
want to label it that way, through ages).
However, when you say "One doesn't constantly engage in such exercises
every time one speaks or writes; if one tried, speech would be impossible",
you are in fact poking at the very reason I do not subscribe to
constructionism: if taken seriously, it makes impossible any speech (in a
previous posting I openly spoke of "aphasia" being the consequence of a
coherent use of S.C.). Otherwise, if taken less than seriously, it cannot
be a useful tool, of course, as any tools that must not be taken seriously
to work.
In fact, either results won't change much if we subscribe through our
analysis to categories such as "men" or "women" or "Western" as meaningful
per se (which they are not), and in this case I can't see why, while
discussing say XVth century homosexuality I am not allowed in the same
guise to concentrate on societal response, mentalities, behaviours et re.,
leaving "homosexuality" as a datum which does not need to be explained for
the sake of my analysis (as now I am constantly asked to do).
Otherwise, if results do change much if we subscribe through our analysis
to categories such as "men" or "women" or "Western" as meaningful per se,
then the method you mention is not correct while focusing on one
deconstruction a time.
Tertium non datur, I guess.
I'm afraid it is false that as you say "Giovanni's point has been made
before, and answered before; perhaps one reason no one responds to his
point is that it becomes boring to make the same points over and over
again". As far as I know it has not been answered yet, but if it has (one
cannot read every book which is being published), well, I subscribed to
this list to learn more than I already knew, so I'll be grateful to have a
bibliographical tip to know where I can find such an answer. Thanks.
As for the final part of the posting, "one gets the sense that the people
raising the issue are not really interested in it, but are only engaging in
rhetorical exercises", I may assure you that your sense is wrong. I am very
much interested in the issue, and I have been raising it for years. One
cannot engage in rhetorical exercises for that long.
By the way, by labelling certain kinds of questions as mere "rhetorical
exercises", while not doing the same with other similar kinds of questions,
you are merely making a discourse. If everything we thing and say comes
from a kind or another one of discourse, I don't see why should it be wrong
wondering as I do from what kind of discourse is your statement stemming.
Deconstructing deconstructive discourse is no "rhetorical exercise" at all:
it is an important methodological issue. One made by social
constructionists first, by the way.
The value of a heuristic method is best tested against itself, actually.
You might think that I am again engaging in "rhetorical exercise", and you
probably do.
So I shall make you an example for a better clarity.
Transsexualism, as a nosological entity, came to being in 1949 only, when a
dr. Cauldwell coined the word (this is a parallel story to the
"homosexuality" word invention in 1869 thus giving birth to "the
homosexual" and so on).
However, after reading scores and scores of case stories from the doctors
that allegedly created the "medical construction of homosexuality" in XIX
century, I realised that a good part, and in some cases most, of their case
histories deal with transsexuals, not with homosexuals, i.e. people who
felt they were women entrapped in male bodies, who liked to dress as if
they were women (I am always dealing with men, since I do not feel entitled
to speak on behalf of women and their history) and behaved accordingly.
This fact has been until now overlooked and ignored by theorists of the
"historical/medical construction of homosexuality" (by the way, I would
like to have Crozier's mind on this particular blind spot).
Now, how would you call these people? Homosexuals, since the word
"transsexual" did not exist yet, whereas they were called names such as
"inverts", "urnings", "transvestiten" and yes, even "homosexuals" as well?
But by doing this, are you not making a statement about the fact that
transsexualism and homosexuality are after all the same thing? (would you?).
Or if you call them transsexuals, then why can't I call a homosexual a XVI
century sodomite who declared he was inclined by Nature towards "Masculine
love" since his birth, or that asters had inclined him to have such and
such desires?
You may get "bored" at my questions, but your getting bored does not give
them an answer at all.
A rhetorical exercise you may call this question as well: actually, you can
call that way any question: after all, any question IS a rhetorical action.
Nevertheless I call it an important methodological issue (by doing so, I
engage in a discourse as well. So what?).
More and more scholars are stumbling on these same difficulties and
contradictions, and we cannot keep for much longer hiding contradictions
behind the carpet for the sake of symmetry of a well-built theory.
My gayest greetings
Giovanni Dall'Orto
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Greg Reeder" <reeder@sirius.com>
Subject: Re: Social constructionism and homosexuality and "rhetorical exercizes"
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 1999 06:37:43 -0700
-----Original Message-----
From: Giovanni Dall'Orto <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
To: Histsex:For historians of sexuality <histsex@listbot.com>
Date: Wednesday, April 28, 1999 1:32 AM
Subject: Social constructionism and homosexuality and "rhetorical exercizes"
>So I shall make you an example for a better clarity.
>Transsexualism, as a nosological entity, came to being in 1949 only, when a
>dr. Cauldwell coined the word (this is a parallel story to the
>"homosexuality" word invention in 1869 thus giving birth to "the
>homosexual" and so on).
You might be interested to know that the ancient Egyptians dealt with this
'catagory" as well.
dating from the
Middle Kingdom is the "Maxims of Ptahhotep" known chiefly from the Prisse
Papyrus located in the Bibliotheque National in Paris and other fragments
held by the British Museum. This collection of advice from a father to his
son are a series of teachings putting forth "abstract ideals of perfect
living and truth". (Parkinson, Voices, p66).
One of these maxims deals directly with our subject. It is curious however
that if one turns to Lichtheim's exhaustive Ancient Egyptian Literature to
read this particular maxim one finds this unusual disclaimer explaining its
absence from her collection."32. This maxim is an injunction against illicit
sexual intercourse. It is very obscure and has been omitted here."(p72 AEL.)
It is the only maxim so censored. A new transaltion of this maxim can now be
found in Richards Parkinson's , The Tale of Sinuhe and Other Ancient
Egyptian Poems 1940-1640 BC. (p260) The maxim is positioned between
one which deals with the advisability of deference to superiors and another
about the importance of dealing directly with a friend when questions arise
as to his character. The offending maxim # 32 reads "You should not have sex
with a women-boy, for you know that what is condemned will be water on his
breast. There is no relief for what is in his belly. Let him not spend the
night doing what is condemned; he will find relief only when he has
abandoned his desire." This of course is very interesting. It introduces the
construct of a 'women-boy' (HMT-HRD) thereby defining a transexual being. I
can't help but think that there are word plays and puns in this as well.
"Water on his breast" could be a play on the name for woman and the
ancient idea that women needed to be colder and wetter than men. (see disc.
p62 Sex and Society in Graeco-Roman Egypt)"No relief in his belly" is echoed
in the very name "boy" which is spelled with the belly glyph. Ptahhotep
advises his son not to have sexual intercourse with such a one for it would
cause the women-boy to do what is condemned. Parkinson mentions the
possibility that the women-boy is a "boy-prostitute". (Homosexual Desire..."
(JEA 81,95 p69).
Of course what is implicit here is that other well known truism "A
prohibition presupposes a practice."
Greg Reeder
reeder@sirius.com
http://www.egyptology.com/
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 1999 15:11:18 -0400
From: Bob <suannschafer@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: Social constructionism and homosexuality and "rhetorical
exercizes"
> ... why can't I call a homosexual a XVI
>century sodomite who declared he was inclined by Nature towards "Masculine
>love" since his birth ...
Giovanni, of course you can do this. Let's take the case of an individual
commonly regarded as a sixteenth-century "homosexual"/"sodomite" -- "il
divino" Michelangelo. I cringe when my students refer to Michelangelo as a
"homosexual." Why? Because describing someone in the sixteenth century as
"gay, "homosexual," "finocchio," "queer," "a faggot," "having same-sex
desire," the list goes on however you choose to describe it, does not have
the same "meaning"/connotation as it does to contemporary audiences. True,
some of these words/phrases perhaps approximate the meaning, or are more
"neutral" in effect, but the comparison/generalization is a crude one --
and as such the words/phrases become meaningless/useless descriptors. In
sum, if you want to characterize someone as "homosexual" in the sixteenth
century, you must explain what it meant to be "homosexual" in the sixteenth
century, as opposed to its "meaning"/connotation today. Michelangelo may
indeed have been "homosexual," but to some in the audience that would
connote the stereotypical, flaming queen of today :)
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Tue, 27 Apr 1999 23:15:01 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: About self-labelling as an "essentialist"
Thanks to Rictor Norton for his detailed answer.
Of course I was not implying that self-labelling as an "essentialist" was
meaningful: just "unwise"....
In fact, as long as an essentialist, in constructionist parlance, is
somebody who thinks there his a specific chromosome compelling gay people
to love Judy Garland (which I don't do, by the way :) ), I refuse to be
labelled by such a caricature of a point of view.
Of course, if somebody objects to my self-labelling as a "moderate
nominalist" saying I am really a "realist" since I imply that reality
exists in itself, although it is continually interpreted by human beings,
then I have nothing to object to such a labelling. After all, realism is a
2,500 years old strain of Western philosophy I have no troubles in getting
defined by, whereas "essentialism" was born and christened in
constructionist writings.
However, as I told you already, maybe it might be wise indeed to have the
Ugly Beast come to life for real at last, so that it can no longer be used
as a dustbin/derogatory label for any theory that does not fit into
constructionist dogmas.
Last but not least, it won't certainly be me who wants to teach you how you
should self-label. :)
Thanks again for you answer
Giovanni Dall'Orto - Milano (Italy)
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 10:42:48 +1000
From: Ivan Crozier <s9801550@pop3.unsw.edu.au>
Subject: Re: Social constructionism and homosexuality and "rhetorical
exercizes"
I'll have a go at this:
GIOVANNI DALL'ORTO WROTE:
"However, after reading scores and scores of case stories from the
doctors that allegedly created the "medical construction of
homosexuality" in XIX century, I realised that a good part, and in some
cases most, of their case histories deal with transsexuals, not with
homosexuals, i.e. people who felt they were women entrapped in male
bodies, who liked to dress as if they were women (I am always dealing
with men, since I do not feel entitled to speak on behalf of women and
their history) and behaved accordingly. This fact has been until now
overlooked and ignored by theorists of the "historical/medical
construction of homosexuality" (by the way, I would like to have
Crozier's mind on this particular blind spot)."
ME AGAIN:
What the historian of medicine who is committed to one of the many
constructivist lines would say is that nineteenth-century doctors had a
certain conception of what homosexuality was. In many cases, especially
prior to Hirschfeld's work on transvestism and Ellis' work on Eonism,
this included gender inversion, or the desire to dress as or be a
woman. This did not necessarily include same sex desire. In fact, many
of Ellis' cases of Eonism were heterosexual, but wanted to dress as
women, and in previous years would have been identified by soem as cases
of homosexuality (but mild ones) (I have a paper coming out in History
of Psychiatry on the processes of constructing Ellis' text _Eonism_, if
you are interested). Earlier in sexology's history there was not any
conception of sexual inversion apart from non-male sexual behaviour and
gender roles (and the reverse for women) which could be used to
categorise people who were transsexual. Such finer differentiations had
not been constructed by the medical field, and so medical practitioners
did not think in terms of these new categories, and therefore had a lot
of trouble identifying cases.
Giovanni Dall'Orto's position on this issue is similar to Jay Prosser in
his paper on transsexualism in Bland and Doan's "Sexology and culture,'
London and Chicago, 1998. Both scholars tend towards re-addressing the
history of medicine by re-diagnosing cases. However, what must be
remembered is that knowledge is **always** constrained by what would
class as an acceptable response (otherwise it does not have the status
of knowledge). And also, what is a reasonable response is not set in
stone, but changes over time. Therefore, what was considered to be an
accurate description of a homosexual girl who liked to dress as a boy
and kiss girls (ie, Westphal, 1869), might under a later medical regime
be re-categorised as a transsexual woman, because she had the feeling
that she was a man trapped in a woman's body. To arrive at the latter
position means that a more nuanced understanding of homosexual behaviour
and transsexual behaviour must be established. In other words, the old
knowledge must be updated. Ellis himself was aware of the many
shortcomings of the usual understanding of homosexuality, and so tried
to rectify this situation in the twentieth century by writing Eonism and
other supplementary studies (1928), following Hirschfeld's work, Die
Transvestismus (1911). Both of these works would have a more acceptable
differentiation of homosexuality as opposed to other gender inversions
to the modern reader. And the modern reader, committed to modern
theories of transsexualism and transvestism, would read the rather
clumsy groping towards categories of sexual identity by medical
practitioners in the early history of sexology as mistaken.
I hope this helps!
Cheers, Ivan
Ivan Crozier,
School of STS,
UNSW, Sydney, 2052,
Australia
email: i.crozier@unsw.edu.au
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: The Hoax of Postmodernism
Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 07:52:19 +0100
Apologies for being frivolous, but I couldn't resist forwarding this from
another discussion list.
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
POSTMODERNISM DENOUNCED AS HOAX!
by Mark Leyner
JENNY JONES: Boy, we have a show for you today! Recently, the University
of Virginia philosopher Richard Rorty made the stunning declaration that
nobody has "the foggiest idea" what postmodernism means. "It would be ice
to get rid of it," he said. "It isn't exactly an idea; it's a word that
pretends to stand for an idea."
This shocking admission that there is no such thing as postmodernism has
produced a firestorm of protest around the country. Thousands of authors,
critics and graduate students who'd considered themselves postmodernists are
outraged at the betrayal.
Today we have with us a writer - a recovering postmodernist - who believes
that his literary career and personal life have been irreparably damaged by
the theory, and who feels defrauded by the academics who promulgated it. He
wishes to remain anonymous, so we'll call him "Alex."
Alex, as an adolescent, before you began experimenting with postmodernism,
you considered yourself - what?
Close shot of ALEX.
An electronic blob obscures his face. Words appear at bottom of screen:
"Says he was traumatized by postmodernism and blames academics."
ALEX (his voice electronically altered): A high modernist. Y'know, Pound,
Eliot, Georges Braque, Wallace Stevens, Arnold Schoenberg, Mies van der
Rohe. I had all of Schoenberg's 78's.
JENNY JONES: And then you started reading people like Jean-Francois Lyotard
and Jean Baudrillard - how did that change your feelings about your
modernist heroes?
ALEX: I suddenly felt that they were, like, stifling and canonical.
JENNY JONES: Stifling and canonical? That is so sad, such a waste. How old
were you when you first read Fredric Jameson?
ALEX: Nine, I think.
The AUDIENCE gasps.
JENNY JONES: We have some pictures of young Alex. ...
We see snapshots of 14-year-old ALEX reading Gilles Deleuze and Felix
Guattari's "Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia." The AUDIENCE oohs
and ahs.
ALEX: We used to go to a friend's house after school - y'know, his parents
were never home - and we'd read, like, Paul Virilio and Julia Kristeva.
JENNY JONES: So you're only 14, and you're already skeptical toward the
"grand narratives" of modernity, you're questioning any belief system that
claims universality or transcendence. Why?
ALEX: I guess - to be cool.
JENNY JONES: So, peer pressure?
ALEX: I guess.
JENNY JONES: And do you remember how you felt the very first time you
entertained the notion that you and your universe are constituted by
language - that reality is a cultural construct, a "text" whose meaning is
determined by infinite associations with other "texts"?
ALEX: Uh, it felt, like, good. I wanted to do it again.
The AUDIENCE groans.
JENNY JONES: You were arrested at about this time?
ALEX: For spray-painting "The Hermeneutics of Indeterminacy" on an
overpass.
JENNY JONES: You're the child of a mixed marriage - is that right?
ALEX: My father was a de Stijl Wittgensteinian and my mom was a
neo-pre-Raphaelite.
JENNY JONES: Do you think that growing up in a mixed marriage made you more
vulnerable to the siren song of postmodernism?
ALEX: Absolutely. It's hard when you're a little kid not to be able to just
come right out and say (sniffles), y'know, I'm an Imagist or I'm a
phenomenologist or I'm a post-painterly abstractionist. It's really hard
-especially around the holidays. (He cries.)
JENNY JONES: I hear you. Was your wife a postmodernist?
ALEX: Yes. She was raised avant-pop, which is a fundamentalist offshoot of
postmodernism.
JENNY JONES: How did she react to Rorty's admission that postmodernism was
essentially a hoax?
ALEX: She was devastated. I mean, she's got all the John Zorn albums and
the entire Semiotext(e) series. She was crushed.
We see ALEX'S WIFE in the audience, weeping softly, her hands covering her
face.
JENNY JONES: And you were raising your daughter as a postmodernist?
ALEX: Of course. That's what makes this particularly tragic. I mean, how
do you explain to a 5-year-old that self-consciously recycling cultural
detritus is suddenly no longer a valid art form when, for her entire life,
she's been taught that it is?
JENNY JONES: Tell us how you think postmodernism affected your career as a
novelist.
ALEX: I disavowed writing that contained real ideas or any real passion. My
work became disjunctive, facetious and nihilistic. It was all blank parody,
irony enveloped in more irony. It merely recapitulated the pernicious
banality of television and advertising. I found myself indiscriminately
incorporating any and all kinds of pop kitsch and shlock. (He begins to
weep again.)
JENNY JONES: And this spilled over into your personal life?
ALEX: It was impossible for me to experience life with any emotional
intensity. I couldn't control the irony anymore. I perceived my own feelings
as if they were in quotes. I italicized everything and everyone. It became
impossible for me to appraise the quality of anything. To me everything was
equivalent - the Brandenburg Concertos and the Lysol jingle had the same
value. .Y.Y. (He breaks down, sobbing.)
JENNY JONES: Now, you're involved in a lawsuit, aren't you?
ALEX: Yes. I'm suing the Modern Language Association.
JENNY JONES: How confident are you about winning?
ALEX: We need to prove that, while they were actively propounding it,
academics knew all along that postmodernism was a specious theory. If we
can unearth some intradepartmental memos - y'know, a paper trail - any
corroboration that they knew postmodernism was worthless cant at the same
time they were teaching it, then I think we have an excellent shot at
establishing liability.
JENNY JONES wades into audience and proffers microphone to a woman.
WOMAN (with lateral head-bobbing): It's ironic that Barry Scheck is
representing the M.L.A. in this litigation because Scheck is the postmodern
attorney par excellence. This is the guy who's made a career of
volatilizing truth in the simulacrum of exculpation!
VOICE FROM AUDIENCE: You go, girl!
WOMAN: Scheck is the guy who came up with the quintessentially postmodern
re-bleed defense for O.J., which claims that O.J. merely vigorously shook
Ron and Nicole, thereby re-aggravating pre-existing knife wounds. I'd just
like to say to any client of Barry Scheck - lose that zero and get a hero!
The AUDIENCE cheers wildly.
WOMAN: Uh, I forgot my question.
Dissolve to message on screen: If you believe that mathematician Andrew
Wiles' proof of Fermat's last theorem has caused you or a member of your
family to dress too provocatively, call (800) 555-9455.
Dissolve back to studio. In the audience, JENNY JONES extends the
microphone to a man in his mid-30's with a scruffy beard and a bandana
around his head.
MAN WITH BANDANA: I'd like to say that this "Alex" is the single worst
example of pointless irony in American literature, and this whole heartfelt
renunciation of postmodernism is a ploy - it's just more irony.
The AUDIENCE whistles and hoots.
ALEX: You think this is a ploy?! (He tears futilely at the electronic
blob.) This is my face!
The AUDIENCE recoils in horror.
ALEX: This is what can happen to people who naively embrace postmodernism,
to people who believe that the individual - the autonomous, individualist
subject - is dead. They become a palimpsest of media pastiche - a mask of
metastatic irony.
JENNY JONES (biting lip and shaking her head): That is so sad. Alex -final
words?
ALEX: I'd just like to say that self-consciousness and irony seem like fun
at first, but they can destroy your life. I know. You gotta be earnest, be
real. Real feelings are important. Objective reality does exist.
AUDIENCE members whoop, stomp and pump fists in the air.
JENNY JONES: I'd like to thank Alex for having the courage to come on today
and share his experience with us.
Join us for tomorrow's show, "The End of Manichean, Bipolar Geopolitics
Turned My Boyfriend Into an Insatiable Sex Freak (and I Love It).
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Chris Willis" <chris@chriswillis.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Slang
Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 23:44:06 +0100
Hi!
I realise this is a rather trivial question, but I wondered if anyone could
please enlighten me as to when the slang expression "knocked up" was first
used to mean "pregnant"? Was it in common use in the mid-19C? George Eliot
uses it to describe a heavily pregnant woman in "Adam Bede" but the context
is ambiguous, and it's uncharacteristic of Eliot to use such an expression,
so I think it may not have been intended in the way 20C readers would
interpret it. Thanks!
All the best
Chris
=========================================
Chris Willis
English Dept
Birkbeck College
Malet Street
London WC1E 7HX
Chris@chriswillis.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Crete/3783/
=========================================
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 13:19:01 +0200
From: "Giovanni Dall'Orto" <giovanni.dallorto@iol.it>
Subject: Michelangelo
In 15.11 28/04/99 -0400, Bob wrote
>Giovanni, of course you can do this. Let's take the case of an individual
>commonly regarded as a sixteenth-century "homosexual"/"sodomite" -- "il
>divino" Michelangelo. I cringe when my students refer to Michelangelo as a
>"homosexual." Why? Because describing someone in the sixteenth century as
>"gay, "homosexual," "finocchio," "queer," "a faggot," "having same-sex
>desire," the list goes on however you choose to describe it, does not have
>the same "meaning"/connotation as it does to contemporary audiences. True,
>some of these words/phrases perhaps approximate the meaning, or are more
>"neutral" in effect, but the comparison/generalization is a crude one --
>and as such the words/phrases become meaningless/useless descriptors. In
>sum, if you want to characterize someone as "homosexual" in the sixteenth
>century, you must explain what it meant to be "homosexual" in the sixteenth
>century, as opposed to its "meaning"/connotation today. Michelangelo may
>indeed have been "homosexual," but to some in the audience that would
>connote the stereotypical, flaming queen of today :)
Dear Bob,
the risk you point at exists hélas with ANY words in any human languages.
In fact, pay attention to this: can you think of ANY word that escapes your
rule that in the past a word that we use today "does not have the same
"meaning"/connotation as it does to contemporary audiences"?
No, huh? :)
Told in a different way: if I did not know who Michelangelo was and I asked
you about, what would you answer me? Perhaps, that he was an Italian Artist
who happened to be homosexual -- no, homosexual you can't say "because the
word does not have the same "meaning"/connotation as it does to
contemporary audiences"?
Well, even "artist" had NOT the same connotation as today. If you teach Art
History, as I assume, you know better than I do that Romantic thought
changed the role and the social place of the artist. As post-Romantics, we
don't look at art as Michelangelo's contemporaries did. An "artist" was in
16th century something very different than today.
And even "Italian" did not mean the same thing as today: Metternich in 19th
century said "Italy is nothing but a geographical expression", and in some
way he was right. In 16th century, Italy was not a nation, whereas nowadays
it is.
But if we simply say that Michelangelo was a Renaissance artist, as well as
a Renaissance Italian, then we understand very well the difference there is
between him and us.
Therefore I do not see why it should be such a shock applying the same
principle also in the field of homosexual history, applying in this case
too the simplest solution, i.e. saying that Michelangelo was a *Renaissance
homosexual* (with all that it means in terms of mentality and ways of
explaining to himself what it meant to be a homosexual).
You say at the beginning of your message: "of course you can do this".
Whereas the central point in Historical constructionism applied to
homosexual history has been and is that *I cannot,* or better *I may not,*
since there is what has been called an "epistemological break" that makes
the homosexual experience before and after 1869 two discrete, un-comparable
entities.
Perhaps this is the single datum you miss to have a complete picture of
what I am discussing about.
Of course all of the fuss is going to disappear if we can all but agree on
the fact that saying "15th century homosexual" is no way more incorrect
than saying 15th century woman, man, cat, artist, Italian, English, king,
dog or tulip or rose. 15th century tulips and roses where *very very*
different from those we call today "roses" and "tulips", as you sure know.
Yet gardeners do not get confused: they simply speak about "ancient roses"...
It's that simple!
Best wishes.
Giovanni Dall'Orto
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 08:01:39 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gregory {Greg} Downing <gd2@is2.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: Slang
At 11:44 PM 4/29/99, "Chris Willis" <chris@chriswillis.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>...I wondered if anyone could
>please enlighten me as to when the slang expression "knocked up" was first
>used to mean "pregnant"? Was it in common use in the mid-19C? George Eliot
>uses it to describe a heavily pregnant woman in "Adam Bede" but the context
>is ambiguous, and it's uncharacteristic of Eliot to use such an expression,
>so I think it may not have been intended in the way 20C readers would
>interpret it. Thanks!
>
The phrase "knock up" is covered fairly well in the second edition of the
Oxford English Dictionary. See the entry for the verb "knock"; meaning 13 is
on "knock up." You may wish to look at how the various meanings of "knock
up" emerge and develop prior to the first currently known written use of
"knocked up" in the sense of pregnant (1813). Here are some early examples
of this sense, from OED2 knock v., meaning 13j:
j. To make (a woman) pregnant; (less commonly) to have sexual intercourse
with (a woman). slang (orig. U.S.).
1813 C. Earle Diary 12 Apr. in J. McPhee Pine Barrens (1971) ii. 33 William
Mick's widow arrived here in pursuit of J. Mick, who she says has knocked
her up.
1836 D. Crockett Exploits & Adv. Texas vii. 97 Nigger women are knocked down
by the auctioneer, and knocked up by the purchaser.
1860 Hotten Dict. Slang (ed. 2) 166 Knocked up. In the United States,
amongst females, the phrase is equivalent to being enceinte, so that
Englishmen often unconsciously commit themselves when amongst our Yankee
cousins.
1925 E. Hemingway In Our Time (1926) 165 Hell, no girls get married around
here till they're knocked up.
The 1860 citation, virtually contemporary with _Adam Bede_, presents the
phrase as still an Americanism, so you may be correct in supposing that
Eliot was not intending that sense, or that connotation, in your passage
(which I have not examined independently). You may wish to think things over
a bit more before dismissing the possibility *entirely*, but the odds are
probably that your first instinct is correct.
Best, Greg D.
Greg Downing/NYU, at greg.downing@nyu.edu or gd2@is2.nyu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 10:05:20 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gregory {Greg} Downing <gd2@is2.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: Slang
Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
In my last note I forgot to mention Eric Partridge's _Dictionary of Slang
and Unconventional English_, which is easily accessible and is often useful
on sexual slang. In the case of "knock up," DSUE doesn't add anything to
what's in OED2, so I didn't include him in my last note, but he does prove
useful on lots of other sexual locutions. The edition I bought in the mid
1990s was the posthumous update (8th ed., 1984). Libraries contains lots of
older editions -- so beware (Partridge constantly updated and corrected
earlier editions till his death in 1979).
Greg Downing/NYU, at greg.downing@nyu.edu or gd2@is2.nyu.edu
___________________________________________________________________ From: "Lesley Hall" <lesleyah@primex.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Slang
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 17:39:19 +0100
I can recollect the expression 'knocked-up' being used at least as late as
the 1960s to mean exhausted by some particular effort.
Lesley Hall
lesleyah@primex.co.uk
___________________________________________________________________
From: "Rictor Norton" <norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Slang
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 15:26:46 +0100
The Cassell Dictionary of Slang (published 1998, and quite up to date) and
Partridge's classic Dictionary of Slang both agree that "knocked up" was
commonly used to mean "pregnant" from the mid nineteenth century. "Knocked"
(by itself, without the "up") was commonly used as low slang from the
sixteenth through eighteenth centuries to mean "fucked". There is some
debate about whether it comes from "knocker" meaning "penis", or "nock"
meaning "cunt" (origin obscure). "Knocked up" is therefore a fairly polite
euphemism, and perhaps Eliot could have meant it that way. That is, in
middle-class circles the low slang origin of the term would not necessarily
have been known.
On the other hand, "knocked up" also had an entirely different meaning:
"exhausted" -- as in "knackered" (also mid-19thC). Which I suppose could
also be experienced by a heavily pregnant woman.
--
Rictor Norton
mailto:norton@rictor.freeserve.co.uk
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/rcnorton.htm
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 13:09:00 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gregory {Greg} Downing <gd2@is2.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: Slang
Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
At 05:39 PM 4/30/99 +0100, "Lesley Hall" <lesleyah@primex.co.uk> wrote:
>Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
>
>I can recollect the expression 'knocked-up' being used at least as late as
>the 1960s to mean exhausted by some particular effort.
>
As stated previously, OED2 traces the history of all the meanings of
"knock(ed) up" at the entry for the verb knock, meaning 18. The last of the
ten senses of "knock up" covered in meaning 18 is "impregnate"; that's why
it's meaning 18j. The sense you cite above is covered in meanings 18g and
18h, both of which date to the 18th century.
Greg Downing/NYU, at greg.downing@nyu.edu or gd2@is2.nyu.edu
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 17:27:46 +0000
From: aquarius@well.com
Subject: Michelangelo loves Abe Lincoln
I think one major issue of misunderstanding may be that the word homosexual is
used by some people to denote a person with same-sex desires or sexual
experiences -- as though that alone were sufficient to define the type -- and by
other people to denote a person who avoids the opposite sex and only has
experience with or desires their own sex. And the point is that in
Michelangelo's time, there was no way to differentiate a type of man solely
based on his same-sex desires or experiences. A lot of men might have expressed
same-sex desires and had same-sex experiences in Michelangelo's day, not because
they were different from other men in some ontological way, but simply because
they chose to do so (in violation of church law). Case in point: Abraham Lincoln
(not a contemporary of Michelangelo I know) had a love affair with a man early
in his life, expressed very tenderly in letters to the other man, but it would
be ludicrous to call him a homosexual because of that. Yet Larry Kramer, not one
to shy away from ludicrousness, is trying to promote Abe Lincoln as "Our Gay
President" on that basis. Our gay president was probably Lincoln's immediate
predecessor James Buchanan, who was never married and brought in a man to serve
as First Lady.
What has made homosexual men recognizable in distinction from ordinary men, has
always -- until this century in AngloSaxia -- been their lack of desire for or
experience with women. This is what needs to be demonstrated for Michelangelo in
order to identify him as "a homosexual."
For homosexual women, particularly butch dykes, the case has been different,
because throughout history any woman with an aggressive demeanor who pursues
other women sexually is likely to be called unfeminine, regardless of whether
she enjoys sex with men or not. Usually she is seen as a would-be competitor
against men for the attentions of more "feminine"-acting women. However, these
"feminine"-acting women would not be differentiated from the majority of women
just because of having homosexual desires or experiences, either.
Mark Brustman
Giovanni Dall'Orto schrieb:
> Histsex:For historians of sexuality - http://homepages.primex.co.uk/~lesleyah
>
> In 15.11 28/04/99 -0400, Bob wrote
>
> >Giovanni, of course you can do this. Let's take the case of an individual
> >commonly regarded as a sixteenth-century "homosexual"/"sodomite" -- "il
> >divino" Michelangelo. I cringe when my students refer to Michelangelo as a
> >"homosexual." Why? Because describing someone in the sixteenth century as
> >"gay, "homosexual," "finocchio," "queer," "a faggot," "having same-sex
> >desire," the list goes on however you choose to describe it, does not have
> >the same "meaning"/connotation as it does to contemporary audiences. True,
> >some of these words/phrases perhaps approximate the meaning, or are more
> >"neutral" in effect, but the comparison/generalization is a crude one --
> >and as such the words/phrases become meaningless/useless descriptors. In
> >sum, if you want to characterize someone as "homosexual" in the sixteenth
> >century, you must explain what it meant to be "homosexual" in the sixteenth
> >century, as opposed to its "meaning"/connotation today. Michelangelo may
> >indeed have been "homosexual," but to some in the audience that would
> >connote the stereotypical, flaming queen of today :)
>
> Dear Bob,
> the risk you point at exists hélas with ANY words in any human languages.
> In fact, pay attention to this: can you think of ANY word that escapes your
> rule that in the past a word that we use today "does not have the same
> "meaning"/connotation as it does to contemporary audiences"?
> No, huh? :)
>
> Told in a different way: if I did not know who Michelangelo was and I asked
> you about, what would you answer me? Perhaps, that he was an Italian Artist
> who happened to be homosexual -- no, homosexual you can't say "because the
> word does not have the same "meaning"/connotation as it does to
> contemporary audiences"?
>
> Well, even "artist" had NOT the same connotation as today. If you teach Art
> History, as I assume, you know better than I do that Romantic thought
> changed the role and the social place of the artist. As post-Romantics, we
> don't look at art as Michelangelo's contemporaries did. An "artist" was in
> 16th century something very different than today.
>
> And even "Italian" did not mean the same thing as today: Metternich in 19th
> century said "Italy is nothing but a geographical expression", and in some
> way he was right. In 16th century, Italy was not a nation, whereas nowadays
> it is.
>
> But if we simply say that Michelangelo was a Renaissance artist, as well as
> a Renaissance Italian, then we understand very well the difference there is
> between him and us.
>
> Therefore I do not see why it should be such a shock applying the same
> principle also in the field of homosexual history, applying in this case
> too the simplest solution, i.e. saying that Michelangelo was a *Renaissance
> homosexual* (with all that it means in terms of mentality and ways of
> explaining to himself what it meant to be a homosexual).
>
> You say at the beginning of your message: "of course you can do this".
> Whereas the central point in Historical constructionism applied to
> homosexual history has been and is that *I cannot,* or better *I may not,*
> since there is what has been called an "epistemological break" that makes
> the homosexual experience before and after 1869 two discrete, un-comparable
> entities.
> Perhaps this is the single datum you miss to have a complete picture of
> what I am discussing about.
>
> Of course all of the fuss is going to disappear if we can all but agree on
> the fact that saying "15th century homosexual" is no way more incorrect
> than saying 15th century woman, man, cat, artist, Italian, English, king,
> dog or tulip or rose. 15th century tulips and roses where *very very*
> different from those we call today "roses" and "tulips", as you sure know.
> Yet gardeners do not get confused: they simply speak about "ancient roses"...
> It's that simple!
>
> Best wishes.
>
> Giovanni Dall'Orto
>
___________________________________________________________________
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 1999 16:59:16 -0400
From: Bob <suannschafer@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: Michelangelo
>>Giovanni, of course you can do this. Let's take the case of an individual
>>commonly regarded as a sixteenth-century "homosexual"/"sodomite" -- "il
>>divino" Michelangelo. I cringe when my students refer to Michelangelo as a
>>"homosexual." Why? Because describing someone in the sixteenth century as
>>"gay, "homosexual," "finocchio," "queer," "a faggot," "having same-sex
>>desire," the list goes on however you choose to describe it, does not have
>>the same "meaning"/connotation as it does to contemporary audiences. True,
>>some of these words/phrases perhaps approximate the meaning, or are more
>>"neutral" in effect, but the comparison/generalization is a crude one --
>>and as such the words/phrases become meaningless/useless descriptors. In
>>sum, if you want to characterize someone as "homosexual" in the sixteenth
>>century, you must explain what it meant to be "homosexual" in the sixteenth
>>century, as opposed to its "meaning"/connotation today. Michelangelo may
>>indeed have been "homosexual," but to some in the audience that would
>>connote the stereotypical, flaming queen of today :)
>
>Dear Bob,
>the risk you point at exists hélas with ANY words in any human languages.
>In fact, pay attention to this: can you think of ANY word that escapes your
>rule that in the past a word that we use today "does not have the same
>"meaning"/connotation as it does to contemporary audiences"?
>No, huh? :)
Sure I can.
the
>Told in a different way: if I did not know who Michelangelo was and I asked
>you about, what would you answer me? Perhaps, that he was an Italian Artist
>who happened to be homosexual -- no, homosexual you can't say "because the
>word does not have the same "meaning"/connotation as it does to
>contemporary audiences"?
I wouldn't characterize him as a homosexual.
>Well, even "artist" had NOT the same connotation as today. If you teach Art
>History, as I assume, you know better than I do that Romantic thought
>changed the role and the social place of the artist. As post-Romantics, we
>don't look at art as Michelangelo's contemporaries did. An "artist" was in
>16th century something very different than today.
Not so different. A quattrocento "artist" could also decorate saddles or
shields; Leonardo & other "artists" of the cinquecento had already begun to
raise the status of the "artist." I don't imagine Leonardo or Michelangelo
decorated many shields, hence the epithet, "il divino," for Michelangelo.
Thus, the "Romantic" notion of the "artist" began long before Romanticism.
>And even "Italian" did not mean the same thing as today: Metternich in 19th
>century said "Italy is nothing but a geographical expression", and in some
>way he was right. In 16th century, Italy was not a nation, whereas nowadays
>it is.
We all know Italy wasn't a country until sometime until the 1860s; some say
it's not a "country" today. When I lived in Milan, the Milanese for the
most part didn't think of themselves as Italians; they were a cut above
mere Italians; they were Milanese. So with the Florentines; the list goes
on.
>But if we simply say that Michelangelo was a Renaissance artist, as well as
>a Renaissance Italian, then we understand very well the difference there is
>between him and us.
>
>Therefore I do not see why it should be such a shock applying the same
>principle also in the field of homosexual history, applying in this case
>too the simplest solution, i.e. saying that Michelangelo was a *Renaissance
>homosexual* (with all that it means in terms of mentality and ways of
>explaining to himself what it meant to be a homosexual).
It's only relevant to term him a "homosexual" if his homosexuality is
somehow important to you. One doesn't characterize Raffaello as a
Renaissance "heterosexual."
>You say at the beginning of your message: "of course you can do this".
>Whereas the central point in Historical constructionism applied to
>homosexual history has been and is that *I cannot,* or better *I may not,*
>since there is what has been called an "epistemological break" that makes
>the homosexual experience before and after 1869 two discrete, un-comparable
>entities.
>Perhaps this is the single datum you miss to have a complete picture of
>what I am discussing about.
I'm the pomo remember? You presume I'm missing any -- let alone a single
-- data.
And Michelangelo was a Florentine painter & sculptor who obtained many
commissions in Florence and Rome, among other Renaissance city-states.
And you fail to address the nuance of my argument.