Ok so after reading History of Sexuality I thought this was just another dry read, but as usual after lecture and hearing the points laid out again in simple terms I actually found it to be pretty interesting.
A few small things in lecture sparked my thoughts, but the one I thought about most was mentioned near the end of the lecture when it was mentioned how much science goes into understanding sexuality, but yet hardly any research actually goes into the improvement of it. This wasn’t talked about for very long, but it stuck in my mind. I never really realized this, but when I think back to grade 9 sex class and all the other lessons in elementary and even regular science classes, we were only really taught about things like how sperm travels and how reproduction works and never on what it feels like, how to improve your sex life (which is completely understandable in elementary school and grade 9), but you would think that these things would be eventually taught. However, those topics are seen as inappropriate to discuss and even with friends and family, topics beside how everything works feel uncomfortable and inappropriate to discuss. The only way it seems to get this information is through magazines and the internet or by experience.
Another was when we were asked what is “sexuality” and the room was silent. There’s certain words you somehow think you know, but when asked directly to define them you realize you don’t completely understand what they mean and it was interesting to discuss what sexuality meant to people and I learned that my definition of sexuality wasn’t completely developed.
That’s all for now, looking forward to hearing more about this in seminars!
Yeah, I wasn’t completely surprised when no one spoke up about what they thought “sexuality” meant. Myself, I had a hard time defining it too! Plus, I guess asking a room full of first year students to define a term like that, in public, might be a bit much! I keep forgetting that the lectures I’ve given lately are on things that not everyone is comfortable discussing. But anyway, I do think part of it is that this is a slippery term that is hard to define when you come right down to it. And so even just the title of the text can be a bit confusing!
And it does make one wonder why sexuality is only treated in a medical way in public, why it’s somehow immoral to speak of it in any other way. Not that this is unusual, as I think it’s the case in many societies! But if that is a natural part of human life, why can’t we talk about how to enjoy it like we talk about how to make good food? It just is really an interesting question to think about, not that I have the answer as to why this has happened.