Pornography as Liberation

Pornography ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 197-231
Author(s):  
Mari Mikkola
Keyword(s):  
Feminist Movement ◽  
Feminist Pornography ◽  
Sex Wars ◽  
Sex Positive

Pornography debates have tended to polarize the feminist movement and led to the “sex wars” of the 1970s and 1980s. The main opposition can be denoted with PorNo (antipornography positions) and PorYes (pro-pornography and “sex positive” outlooks), but is fraught with difficulties. For example, it is unclear what exactly is under dispute: Is the disagreement about how to define the concept of pornography or merely about which materials fall under it? Subsequently, the chapter considers two questions: Is feminist pornography possible? Might pornography be emancipatory? The chapter answers both questions with “yes” and considers what would make pornography feminist and/or liberatory when thinking about racialization, ability, and “fattism” in pornography. It argues that neither an unqualified PorNo nor an unqualified PorYes position is tenable. Furthermore, these positions share many basic commitments; but both sides tend to paint the opposition in an uncharitable light and in a manner that distorts the debate.

scholarly journals A reading on feminism on feminism and pornography through Jury Lotman's culture and explosion: Reflections

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 121-137
Author(s):  
Mega Afaf
Keyword(s):  
Digital Age ◽  
Research Paper ◽  
Dark Side ◽  
Feminist Movement ◽  
The Political ◽  
Future Directions ◽  
Sign Systems ◽  
Constant Change ◽  
Feminist Pornography ◽  
Feminist Movements

We endeavor through this research paper to read the feminist movements, in particular countries in order to understand its dynamics and at the same time to foresee its future directions. To achieve this, as an adequate tool, Juri Lotman’s Culture and Explosion (2009) provides us a model for reading the different dynamics within feminism, as a cultural text, as well as its interconnection to other sign systems within the same semiotic sphere. Thus we can understand the interconnection of feminism with politics and society, and with its plurality of discourses makes it in constant change and exposed to explosions which would change its course in the future. These explosions are displayed through the political acts which were passed in favour of the women as a result of the feminist dynamics. Besides, the feminist movement has the capacity to integrate into other movements and also can be transformed into other movements, and thus, new realities and discourses are created. Within this arena, among these realities is the anti-feminist pornography as opposed to pro-sex feminists. From our stand point, pornography, and especially that in the digital age, is the dark side of the feminist movement. Semiotically, in Lotman’s (2009) model, pornography is abnormal, sick or non-existent because it is different from the norm. In the light of this, we are able to expose different views about the harms of pornography both on women and even men.

Sex Positive: Feminism, Queer Theory, and the Politics of Transgression

2000 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-45 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elisa Glick
Keyword(s):  
Queer Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Sex Wars ◽  
Sex Positive

From the feminist ‘sex wars’ of the 1980s to the queer theory and politics of the 1990s, debates about the politics of sexuality have been at the forefront of contemporary theoretical, social, and political demands. This article seeks to intervene in these debates by challenging the terms through which they have been defined. Investigating the importance of ‘sex positivity’ and transgression as conceptual features of feminist and queer discourses, this essay calls for a new focus on the political and material effects of pro-sexuality.

Feminist Perspective in Shashi Deshpande's “That Long Silence”

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
Mohammad Ahashan ◽  
Dr. Sapna Tiwari
Keyword(s):  
Gender Equity ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
Feminist Movement ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Simone De Beauvoir ◽  
Equal Rights ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Key Aspects

Man has always tried  to determine  and tamper the image of woman and especially her identity is manipulated and orchestrated. Whenever a woman is spoken of, it is always in the relation to man; she is presented as a wife , mother, daughter and even as a lover but never as a woman  a human being- a separate entity. Her entire life is idealized and her fundamental rights and especially her behaviour is engineered by the adherents of patriarchal society. Commenting  on the Man-woman relationship in a marital bond Simone de Beauvoir wrote in her epoch-making book entitled The Second Sex(1949): "It has been said that marriage diminishes man,  which is often true , but almost always it annihilates women". Feminist movement advocates the equal rights and equal opportunities for women. The true spirit of feminism is into look at women and men as human beings. There should not be gender bias or discrimination in familial and social life. To secure gender justice and gender equity is the key aspects of feminist movement. In India, women writers have come forward to voice their feminist approach to life and the patriarchal family set up. They believe that the very notion of gender is not only biotic and biologic episode but it has a social construction.

Powerful Inscriptions: On the Semiotic Phenomenology of BDSM

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Joseph Martin
Keyword(s):  
Future Research ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Linguistic Turn ◽  
Making Sense ◽  
Sociology Of Deviance ◽  
History Of ◽  
Semiotic Phenomenology ◽  
Sex Wars

BDSM encompasses a range of practices—bondage and discipline (BD), dominance and submission (DS), sadism and masochism (SM)—involving the consensual exchange of power in erotic contexts. This chapter provides an overview of scholarship on BDSM, drawing on the history of academic studies of the phenomenon, ranging from the psychology of perversion, the sociology of deviance, and the feminist “sex wars” to more recent ethnographic and phenomenological turns. The chapter focuses on the importance of discourse and affect for making sense of BDSM, both for those who seek to analyze the phenomenon and for practitioners themselves. Drawing on ethnographic research and other data, the chapter shows how language and discourse are key to answering interconnected questions about the semiotics and phenomenology of BDSM (what these practices mean and how practitioners experience these practices affectively). Thus, a potential “linguistic turn” in BDSM studies is essential for future research on this erotic minority.

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