Title: Young people, identity, relationships and sexuality in turbulent times
1Young people, identity, relationships and
sexuality in turbulent times
2Young people, sexuality, identity and
relationships
- rethinking through the WRAP project. What we
thought then, what I think now. - impact of the WRAP on research into and
understandings of young peoples sexuality and
sexual practice - Studies of sexuality in schools reproduction,
production and resistance - Two more poststructuralist studies
- Relationships in the Inventing Adulthoods study
3Rethinking WRAP
- Different decade, same old shit
- Young women may have access to more sexual
information than any generation in the past, are
probably more sexually experienced and are more
likely to espouse sexually egalitarian ideas, but
the vast majority are still trapped within the
confines of heterosexual relations which
privilege mens desires and pleasures at their
expense. (Jackson, 1999 31)
4Rethinking WRAP
- WRAP definition of sexuality
- sexual practices and identities, and the varied
historical and cultural forms that these can take - sexual beliefs and desires and how these are
socially negotiated, and constructed in social
relationships - embodied in the sense that it entails bodily
activity- physical, desire and reproduction. - But this is both material and social, since what
is embodied and experienced is made meaningful
through language, culture and values.
5Rethinking WRAP
- We have no party line on feminism, and we have
not always agreed with each other as a research
team, but explaining ourselves to each other and
arguing through our differences has been
productive. (Holland et al. 19984) - The newer terminologies of materiality and
materialization do not simply signal the
displacement of the concept of the material by
the cultural. They can induce feminist
constructionism to work with a sociologically
more adequate reconceptualization of the social
as a more fully integrated realm of symbolic and
material practices. (Rahman and Witz 2003 253 - What really matters is how these newer
terminologies of materiality and
materialization induce us to develop a fuller
social ontology of gender and sexuality one that
weaves together social, cultural, experiential
and embodied practices. (Rahman and Witz 2003
243)
6Rethinking WRAP
- We were concerned with the social construction of
heterosexuality and saw heterosexual power as
being constructed at a number of levels or
layers - the discursive - language, ideas, beliefs, norms,
values, discourses and their effects - embodied embodied practices, sexual experiences
and their meanings - individual and relational how people negotiate
and produce their relationships involving agency
and action - institutional structured, institutionalised
power relations between sexual partners,
heterosexuality constructed as hierarchal -
family, law, economy, state - historically specific and subject to change
7Rethinking WRAP
- the ever-present watcher peering through the
keyhole, peering through the keyhole in your own
head, if nowhere else. You are a woman with a
man inside watching a woman (Attwood 1993 392) - We take the male-in-the-head to indicate the
surveillance power of male-dominated and
institutionalised heterosexuality, as distinct
from the man-in-the-bed of everyday experience
(p.10).
8Rethinking WRAP
- YW ..well I think that I dont enjoy sex for
what it is right, when a fella is like going
away, Im not enjoying that, the actual
intercourse. I like enjoyment from, I know it
sounds like a typical woman statement, but them
actually doing it and them enjoying themselves
and - Q What, you enjoy him enjoying himself, right,
you get pleasure from his pleasure- - A And also, like eh, oral sex, right.
- Q Right, so things that that usually, that are
sort of called foreplay thats what you get
pleasure out of? - A Yeah, the actual, I mean not a lot of women, I
dont think I mean theyve got to be very lucky
to give you an orgasm, cos theyve got to hit
something quite a few times (Holland et al
1998/2004 111)
9Rethinking WRAP
- YM I tend to ask some girlfriends what they
prefer sort of thing, and try and do that to them - Q And what do you find they do prefer?
- A A bit more caring and a bit more slowly, not
just get undressed and do it and just sit there.
They tend to like it a bit more caring and
lovingly even thought I didnt love them. I did
try to keep them happy. (Holland et al 1993 25)
10Impact of WRAP
- this tension between a static top-down view of
male power, and power as something fluid,
contestable and individually negotiated features
throughout the book (Frith 2000 117). - taken up and replicated, or the ideas developed
and expanded in e.g. UK, New Zealand, Australia,
South Africa, Brazil, Croatia, Finland, Spain - an analytical approach into different areas of
study in different countries eg violence against
women, computing, beauty therapy, health
promotion, contraceptive behaviour, sexual and
other risk taking, and resistance to dominant
discourses.
11Impact of WRAP
- high impact on sex education in the UK
- important contributions to HIV/AIDS research in
- moving away from a focus on high risk groups and
problematizing conventional heterosexual
relations - by moving away from attempts to quantify sexual
practice to a qualitative exploration of social
and cultural meanings - by revealing the power of heterosexuality as
masculine and showing the relevance of this
power to young peoples management of sexual
safety (Frith 2000)
12Impact of WRAP
- Brazil
- the subject positions made available to the
girls in public discourses of risk, conflict with
those available in gender discourses - sexual initiative is not a real option for
girls. Under dominant gender regimes
initiative and action are masculine roles. A
girl showing sexual initiative may be seen as
having sexual knowledge and expertise, which
itself would be seen as a sign of previous and
multiple sexual experiences. This does not fit
into the prevalent conventional model of feminine
passivity/masculine activity (de Oliveira 2002).
13Impact of WRAP
- Australia
- lack of what she calls affirmative feminine
sexuality and sexual pleasure masculine
sexuality was constructed as a biological drive
by both sexes, and there was a high level of
sexual coercion and pressure on the young women. - But young women were keen to present themselves
as equal to young men, having agency in their
relationships. - A narrative where they are the agents of
relationship management, knowledgeable about
mens behaviour, active subjects in the
relationship. But problematic when they
experience violence - conceptual framework of WRAP helps to explain how
both men and women can have little empathy with
or sympathy for women who are victims of domestic
violence, it enables them to minimise the
violence and to continue to privilege the
importance of the relationship.
14Impact of WRAP
- Louisa Allen (2003) in New Zealand, and Fiona
Stewart (1999) in Australia were both interested
in resistance to dominant discourses of
(hetero)sexuality, possible shifts in definitions
and practices of femininity for young womens
experience of heterosex. - Louisa Allens title Girls want sex, boys want
love, was a comment from a participant talking
about how sexuality is gendered - I mean you have got your stereotypical, women
want commitment and love, and guys just want a
fling, but I think that girls are pretty much
like that as well (laugh) (Rosalind, 17) - I was called a slut when I cheated on someone and
I was called a slutbut a slut is supposed to be
someone who sleeps around, I dont sleep around
(Anna, 17)
15Impact of WRAP
- The young women in Fiona Stewarts study show a
critical consciousness, and adopt alternative
femininities that challenge the norms of
heterosex in a number of ways. - they take a proactive approach and initiate
sexual contact, - they own their sexual desire,
- they seek and engage in other forms of sexual
practice than penetration - there was a transition from relative
powerlessness in relationships, to one of control
and direction.
16Methodological comments
- The male model of empowerment
- Angela I just get carried away. I believe in
equality, like a woman has a need as much as a
man, and I think at the time, Oh yes, sod it. A
fellow is allowed to get a pat on the back and a
drink bought them. - Her assertiveness can be conceived of as
intellectual empowerment, but she experienced it
in a contradictory way - The dynamics of her strategy of empowerment
characterise the accounts of other young women in
the sample, whose words and behaviour, while
actively resisting conventional femininity,
ultimately seem to reinscribe the conventions of
heterosexuality. - This reinscription of normativity is a strand
that runs through the findings of work on gender
and sexuality from Angela McRobbie in 1976. to
Sinikka Aapola and her colleagues in 2005
17Methodological comments
- intellectual empowerment was expressed through
the young womens intentions and expectations
about having their needs and desires met in a
relationship and their assertiveness in stating
these needs - experiential empowerment referred to the degree
to which they were able to put these plans and
desires into practice from their own report. - Raises the issue of interpretation. In coding and
analysing the transcripts we drew on three levels
of meaning - Â
- 1. The language and meanings used by the young
people and explicit in the language of the
interview transcripts - 2. team discussion, interpretation and coding of
the data, in the light of feminist and
sociological theories - 3. explanation of any differences between these
first two levels.
18Education and institutionalised heterosexuality
- in contrast to the focus on the part played by
schools in reproducing hierarchical relations of
gender, class, and race, recent work on sexuality
has turned to contemplate and investigate schools
as productive of sexuality, and of
gendered/sexualised identities, within a
framework of normative heterosexuality. - range of theoretical resources, from postmodern,
to queer, to psychosocial - includes research on gay and lesbian identities
and an examination of masculinities, recognising
that boys too are gendered subjects
19Education and institutionalised heterosexuality
- in general this work is denaturalising gender and
heterosexuality in opposition to the impetus of
the school which is to naturalise gendered
hierarchy and heterosexuality. - it also draws on more fluid notions of relations
of power, seeing power not only as top down, but
created locally. - studies of the official school and its
curriculum, and the informal school, can be a
focus of empirical attention, and a favoured
method is ethnography - this is a context where informal cultures of the
school are often saturated with sex, through
innuendo, humour, commentary and types of
enactment or performance, but the official
culture seeks to deny the sexual.
20Education and institutionalised heterosexuality
- Mary Jane Kehilys findings, like many before her
- The pervasive presence of homophobia, the concern
with notions of reputation and the
naturalisation of heterosexuality within the
school site echo many of the themes of earlier
work (Kehily, 2002 206). - she is keen to identify the young people as
active autonomous agents specifically here in
relation to sexual issues - She identifies student sexual cultures,
describing them as the meanings ascribed to
issues of sexuality by students themselves in
peer groups, same sex friendship groups and in
social interaction more generally - From the perspective of young people themselves,
their informal peer group cultures remain one of
the few sites within school that is not shaped by
the demands of teachers, parents, politicians and
policy makers. - Kehily argues that a particular version of
masculinity is being invoked in talk and action
by young men in schools, and in this
heterosexuality is seen as central to a masculine
sense of self, premised on doing and display, and
involving bodily practices and performances.
21Two poststructural approaches Kerry Robinson
- Sexual harassment and sexual violence become
part of the performance of hegemonic masculinity
that can cement gendered cultural bonds between
those boys and men who take up this form of
masculinity as their own, creating a sense of
identity. (Robinson 2005 20) - is not a fixed character type, always and
everywhere the same. It is, rather the
masculinity that occupies the hegemonic position
in a given pattern of gender relations, a
position always contestable (Connell 1996 76). - Ones subjective positioning is not fixed, but
can discursively shift as individuals read their
locations within relations of power, claiming or
resisting discourses according to what they want
to achieve ( Robinson 2005 23)
22Two poststructural approaches Kerry Robinson
- Boys explanations for sexual harassment of girls
- Yes, boys do that (sexual harassment). They
often call girls names and they touch girls but
it is only a joke! - Its natural Boys do things like pinch girls on
the bottom, pull their hair and call them names,
but no more than normal. There is always that in
any school. - Â
- Some girls ask for it They get called that
because of the way they act and what they look
like. They have the reputations for being
slack! - what will my friends say? Here they are
referring to the pressures of the male peer
group.
23Two poststructural approaches Kerry Robinson
- Connell and Kimmel on the male peer group
- the peer group, not individuals, are the
bearers of gender definitions (Connell 1996
220) - as adolescents we learn that our peers are a
kind of gender police, constantly threatening to
unmask us as feminine, as sissies (Kimmel 1994
132). - It is crucial that intervention strategies are
based on deconstructing discourses of hegemonic
masculinity that limit the options of gendered
identities open to young men (and young women)
and perpetuate powerful cultural binaries such as
male/female and heterosexual/non-heterosexual
that operate to radically and aggressively
exclude the Other. (Robinson 200535)
24Two poststructural approaches Deborah Youdell
- sex, gender and sexuality are constituted in
constellations that open up possibilities and set
limits for who a student can be (250). - Like Robinson, and other researchers, Youdell
draws attention to the intersectionality of
masculinities, sexualities, ethnicity and class - Youdell proceeds from an understanding that
school practices are permeated by enduring
hetero-normative discourses that inscribe a
linear relationship between sex, gender and
(Hetero) sexuality within the heterosexual
matrix ( Youdell 2005 253). - She suggests that sex-gender-sexuality are joined
in complex constellations that join together the
body and discourse.
25Two poststructural approaches Deborah Youdell
- she sees identity, categories such as gender and
sexuality, as constituting subjects, but also as
equivocal, and this is where her space for agency
for the subject appears. These names of identity
categories are open to strategic reinscription.
- Youdell is saying that sex-gender-sexuality are
not causally related, but exist in
constellations, and to name one category of the
constellation is to silently infer further
categories in a citational chain. The example
she gives is that the identity dyke silently
constitutes hetero-femininity. The elements of
the constellation sex-gender-sexuality are
constructed together.
26Two poststructural approaches Deborah Youdell
- Girls sit cross-legged with upper bodies
drooping over the legs. They hold their hands in
their laps, those wearing skirts hold the fabric
and/or their hands to conceal groins. Some sit
with their knees bent close to the chest, wrap
their arms around their bent legs and again hold
their skirt fabric or hands to conceal the
genital area. - Â
- For boys Bent knees are rarely touching,
pulled up close to the chest, or hugged.
Outstretched legs lie apart. Boys often lean
backwards and prop themselves up with braced
arms.
27Two poststructural approaches Deborah Youdell
- this indicates a contradiction in the discursive
constitution of heterosexual femininity - the requirement for the female-feminine body to
deny its desire and to take responsibility for
the control and constraint of the body and of
sex - but also to display sexuality and be the
repository for the body, sex and desire. This is
a double bind underscored by the dichotomy of the
virgin/whore.
28Two poststructural approaches Deborah Youdell
- Int How do you know if people are virgins or
not? - Molly I dunno, because people dont give a shit.
- Diane Indicating Nicola She aint.
- Nicola Shouting, high pitch I am Diane
- Molly Laughing She aint.
- Int How do you know?
- Nicola More serious, agitated But Im still
joking around, Im just having a laugh Molly! - Molly Yeah but people like boys name and
boys name, theyll take it differently and
think Ah, shes a right little slapper and
that.
29Two poststructural approaches Deborah Youdell
- Youdell also shows that middle class young women
in her group have greater freedom to enact an
active and consenting hetero-femininity (without
becoming a slapper or whore). - She gave an example of a young woman engaging in
bodily play with a young man in which he took the
lead but she was a consenting partner. Here the
young womans middle-classness gave her
institutional protection and an alternative
liberal/feminist discourse of sexual liberation
and gender equality. Through this she could
constitute herself as feminine and desiring. - Another example was of a young woman who
jettisoned heterosexual femininity altogether.
She wore combat trousers and various bodily
adornments indicating a lesbian identity - Youdell does see these as examples of girls
opening discursive spaces for themselves to be
otherwise
30Some concluding remarks
- Stevi Jackson and Sue Scott suggest that
progress in sexual matters is extremely uneven,
which leads to sexual antinomies or
contradictions and paradoxes. - They see this as a result of the specialness of
sex, that it is seen as separable from mundane
everyday life, with the potential to deliver
ecstasy. - At the same time it is also seen as uniquely
problematic and liable to provoke anxiety,
disgust and revulsion (Jackson and Scott 2004
233).
31Some concluding remarks
- A further contradiction lies in the greater
acceptance, even valorization of sexual
diversity, particularly in popular culture where
gay and queer characters abound, alongside the
continued primacy of institutionalized
heterosexuality as the normative mode of adult
relationship. - Even gay and lesbian relationships are more
acceptable if they buy into the dominant values
of normative heterosexuality, are long-term,
monogamous, stable.
32Relationships in inventing adulthoods
- Unlike earlier generations - who tended to follow
normative patterns - most young people in this
study did not appear to enter and sustain
relationships for the sake of getting married and
having children, although when we first met them
aged 11-18, most of them had expected to do just
that - Having a good friend, a sexual partner, a
companion, someone to have fun with and confide
in, were some of the qualities they sought in an
attempt to create a special relationship that
was adjusted to their individualised plans and
needs. - Although relationships are changing, and breaking
up more frequently, as can be seen in patterns of
divorce and repartnering, and serial monogamy,
what is clear is that relationships, and
commitment within relationships, are things that
many young people still crave
33Relationships in inventing adulthoods
- Fusion
- the fact that I wouldnt want to live without
him, I couldnt live without him, I just
couldnt, its like I could never remember him
not being in my life..andthe fact that hes just
like, hes not just a husband, and lover hes the
bestest friend Ive ever had, completely made for
each other. And its always having someone there,
when you need them (Hazel, aged 19) - I dont know why I find it while hard when Im
really pissed off, just like you know parents
problems or whatever I just feel stupid and
foolish talking to a friend or something, but my
girlfriend like I could talk to her about
anything and shed just sit and shed be
listening, I can talk to her about it. (Glen,
aged 21)
34Relationships in inventing adulthoods
- Autonomy
- I'm definitely, definitely going. I have offered
him he can come with me if he wants, I've even
offered since we've broken up he can come with me
as a friend as I would love to have him come with
me but he's not going to hold me back because if
he held me back I would hate him it might take a
while because I might be happy to stay with him
now but come a years time or come fifteen years
time I would hate him for taking away my chance
like because I wouldn't see it as me giving up my
chance for him I would see it as him taking away
my chance, I know I would. (Karin, aged 19) )
35Relationships in inventing adulthoods
- Uncommitted
- You don't have your own time any more, you can't
do what you want to do, you always have to
consider someone else now, just not me.
(Malcolm, aged 18) - I suppose you're always together stuck to each
other like most of my friends and their
girlfriends are like they never do anything
without each other they always have to ask
permission can I go here, can I do this, whereas
I don't need to ask I just go and do so I don't
have to worry about any of that so I'm happy.
(Naz, aged 21)