Thursday, August 2, 2012

Sexy Academics

I have always been fascinated by sexuality and ritual.  All of my work seems to return to those two motifs.  I try to include social justice issues like domestic violence or access to health care, but after the dust has settled from the field, it comes back to that.  My initial proposal for my PhD work was to study the ways sex workers in Texas constructed community and relied on social networks (of the people variety, not blogs) to meet everyday needs, like childcare, medical care, or self care.  For a variety of reasons, it didn't work out.

Trying an alternate strategy, I began canvassing local "adult" bookstores, trying out the practicality of examining consumption patterns of sexual materials.  I stumbled onto the local BDSM scene.  In the end, it worked out for me, as it does for most anthropologists.  Given enough years in grad school, a budding anthropologist is bound to find something to write home about, even if it isn't what she set out to study.

I find my research deeply satisfying.  I love talking about it, thinking about, and on some days, even writing about it.  I am also very conscious of it being "sexy."  I would be obscuring the truth if I didn't say that this was part of the allure when I first started.  I felt I was being subversive just by studying sexuality.  I think that this is still mostly true.  What I didn't count on was how distracting being sexy is.  Some days I feel like saying, "Yes, it's about sex, but that's only the nuts and bolts.  The really interesting stuff is so much more about identity, community, resistance, and acquiescence."  All the scalpels and single-tailed whips aside, it boils down to human experience.

Every person I have told about my research seems interested.  Most of the initial questions involve some permutation of "What's the craziest thing you have seen?" followed closely by "But do you think it is normal/ okay/ right?"  Sometimes I pretend I would get the same response if I had worked with pastoralists in Central Asia.  I imagine people questioning the fundamental goodness of their subsistence patterns in reaction to my witty insights.  The interesting thing, to me, is that people then go on to confess their own experiences or desires.

I occasionally worry that the sexiness of my topic obscures my theoretical underpinnings.  I also worry about alienating people.  I have very little filter and often presume that everyone is as comfortable discussing Foucault as discussing the finer points of orgasm.  I usually make people uncomfortable one way or the other.  A little discomfort is good for the soul but I don't want to shut down dialogue.  I don't want to be dismissed because I "only" study sexuality.  Birth, death, spirituality, gender, power, sexuality all have very different meanings depending on one's culture and social location.  That is the crux of anthropology.

I brashly chose to work on an explicitly sexual topic, idealistically thinking that it wouldn't matter.  I know now it does matter, and I think it makes it all the more important.  Trivializing or obsessing over sex takes it out of context when it is deeply contextual.  It is sometimes disheartening when people get fixated on the mechanics but I think every little bit of openness about sexuality and desire creates a space for a discussion of their significance.

It remains to be seen how this will play out in the larger scheme of my professional life.  Even blogging  about it makes me a little nervous.  But I figure my dissertation will be published soon and there is no pretending that it is not about sexuality.  I wouldn't change it, sexy academics and all.  Hopefully once I've grabbed your attention with my risque topic, I can keep it by offering challenging interpretations of the human condition.

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