Heterosexuality in Theory and Practice

Chris Beasley, Heather Brook, Mary Holmes

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN:
  9780415629676
• eBook ISBN:
  9781136247057
• Topic: Ciencias sociales
• Subtopic: Estudios de género

This book explores heterosexualities in their complex and everyday expressions. It engages with theories about the intersection of sexuality with other markers of difference, and gender in particular. The outcome will productively upset equations of heterosexuality with heteronormativity and accounts that cast heterosexuality in "sex critical, sex as danger" terms. Queer/feminist 'pro-sex' perspectives have become prevalent in analyses of sexuality, but in these approaches queer becomes the site of subversive, transgressive, exciting and pleasurable sex, while heterosex, if mentioned at all, continues to be seen as objectionable or dowdy. It challenges heterosexuality's comparative absence in gender/sexuality debates and the common constitution of heterosexuality as nasty, boring and normative. The authors develop an innovative analysis showing the limits of the sharply bifurcated perspectives of the "sex wars". This is not a revisionist account of heterosexuality as merely one option in a fluid smorgasbord, nor does it dismiss the weight of feminist/pro-feminist critiques of heterosexuality. This book establishes that if relations of domination do not constitute the analytical sum of heterosexuality, then identifying its range of potentialities is clearly important for understanding and helping to undo its "nastier" elements.

Part I
Unpacking the Monolith

1 Nasty, Boring, and Normative?

Heterosexuality within the Conceptual Map of Gender and Sexuality Studies

INTRODUCTION

This opening chapter asserts that the present conceptual map within Gender/Sexuality Studies is inadequate. In particular it notes that the subject of heterosexuality remains a largely invisible presence in the critical literature. While this invisibility undoubtedly bespeaks its privileged positioning (Gardiner 2005; Kimmel 1997), the consequence is that heterosexuality is seldom the centrepiece of reflective analysis, let alone attaining the detailed attention as an arena of inquiry that is evident in relation to other sexualities (and associated gender scholarship).

Moreover, the present conceptual map within Gender/Sexuality Studies is inadequate insofar as it has failed to move on from earlier debates, and still casts heterosexuality as fundamentally oppressive because it is utterly encapsulated by its normalising function and prerogatives. The few more ‘positive’ representations have not radically altered this overall drift. Despite a small number of important efforts attending to heterosexuality (Jackson and Scott 2010; Jackson 1999; Vance [1989] 1992), robust conceptions of hetero-pleasure and its possibilities have not been sustained within the Gender/Sexuality field. For example, Meika Loe's (2004) fascinating research on Viagra in the US may challenge the view of heterosexual men as always powerful and predatory, but in its concern with sexual dysfunction is not well placed to generate an expanded and productive analysis of hetero-pleasure. Against the great majority of accounts in the critical scholarly and policy literature attending to gender/sexuality, this chapter asserts that heterosexuality is not inevitably nasty, boring, and normative.

In suggesting that heterosexuality is routinely characterised as nasty, we do not mean to minimise or trivialise the incidence of sexual violence or other problems associated with heterosexuality. Rather, we seek to explore ways of being heterosexual or ‘doing’ heterosexuality that are not inevitably subordinating. Scholarship that presents heterosexuality as (still) unpleasant and dangerous for many women maintains its critical purchase (for instance, Levy 2005; Holland et al 1998) but risks situating heterosexuality as merely unpleasant and dangerous. It is certainly not our intention to deny that heterosexual practices and institutions may well be problematic, but rather to challenge absolutist and unchanging explanations of sexualities, including heterosexuality. Our aim, then, is to present a more detailed, more wide-ranging and inclusive account.

Similarly, in suggesting that heterosexuality is generally presented as boring, we do not deny that heterosexuality is usually unmarked and assumed. However, the acknowledgment that heterosexuality is culturally omnipresent and often wrongly universalised slides into the more troublesome contention that non-straight or queer sexualities are the only interesting sexual subject positions. ‘Sexuality’ attaches to marked, subordinate, devalued, and multiple queer subjectivities in much the same way that ‘gender’ attaches to the feminine. Nevertheless, just as men are gendered, so ‘straight’ is also a sexuality. Retrieving and revaluing knowledge and pleasure from the subordinate position is an entirely worthwhile and necessary endeavour, but it does not mean that the privileged binary partner should elude attention. We are not suggesting that studies of heterosexuality merit some notion of ‘equal time’ in Sexuality Studies any more than we would argue that studies of men and masculinity should dominate ‘Gender Studies’. Rather, we wish to suggest that heterosexuality is more than a bland foil for the exploration of inherently more interesting sexualities, and demands investigation in its own right. In particular, we aim to challenge the universalising tendency of the hetero/homo binary, and in doing so demonstrate diversely interesting aspects of heterosexuality.

Finally, in suggesting that heterosexuality is wrongly characterised as normative, we do not deny the social weight of heteronormativity and its effects. Recognition of heterosexuality's status as the privileged norm in sexual culture, as the unquestioned and natural, is undoubtedly crucial. As Bhattacharyya notes, heterosexuality is ‘the sex that just is, that needs no explanation, that everyone knows about, has access to and can do without learning’ (2002: 18). We acknowledge without hesitation the saturation of heterosexist norms and values in a very wide range of social discourses. Again, however, we seek to challenge the closely proximate idea that heterosexuality cannot offer opportunities for social innovation. While analyses focusing on the heteronormativity of heterosexuality are clearly valuable, and evidently inform this book, we want to offer a more complex picture.

Heterosexuality is in some ways the elephant in the contemporary Gender/Sexuality Studies room—simultaneously hugely present and yet somehow ignored—and, when it is occasionally noticed, heterosexuality is conceived almost entirely pessimistically. In this context, we suggest that heterosexuality can be revisioned as open to enjoyment and social change. Indeed, it can be pleasurable or comfortably mundane, is sometimes exciting, and can even be unorthodox, transgressive, subversive, or resistant (see Chapters 3, 5, and 6). Heterosexuality thus illustrates that which is crucial to social thought—that is, social norms are not totally determining. Practices are almost always excessive, escaping norms, and this is precisely how social innovation and change may arise. Although we most assuredly reject any ‘recidivist’ attempt to reconfigure heterosexuality in ways that ignore its relation to the normative or which disconnect it from power relations, we also suggest that without reflective analysis its super-ordinate status remains poorly understood and is less amenable to creative refashioning.

We attend to this analysis by employing a focus on the theoretical frameworks in the Gender/Sexuality field as a shorthand means to consider how heterosexuality is understood in the field. Indeed, more specifically we concentrate upon the main theoretical approaches in the major subfields—that is, in Feminist, Sexuality, and Masculinity Studies—which shape the overall agendas of these subfields. In other words, the discussion does not and cannot cover every single framework, writer, or text in the subfields, but rather is intended to make a case based upon their major trajectories.

GENDER/SEXUALITY STUDIES: CONCEPTUALISING THE FIELD

We refer to the Gender/Sexuality field in order to draw upon the most usual scholarly terminologies, in English language usages at least, for sexed and sexual respectively (Edwards 1989: 1–12). The terminologies of ‘gender’ and ‘sexuality’ are employed in the three major subfields of the Gender/Sexuality field—that is, in Feminist, Masculinity, and Sexuality Studies (see Figure 1.1). However, the Gender/Sexuality field is not simply the sum of these three existing subfields. It necessitates some explanation and is certainly a loose assemblage (Beasley 2009a, 2005).

Figure 1.1 The Gender/Sexuality field and subfields.

All the same, we suggest that there are several important reasons for claiming it as a field, even if a field in process. This province of thinking can be discovered in the continuing linkages which many writers make between gender and sexuality. For example, even Queer theorists—who dispute any intrinsic connection between the two terms—constantly invoke references to gender as well as sexuality. An instance of this continuing interplay arises in Stephen Whittle's (1996) lively refutation of gender in ‘Gender fucking or fucking gender?’. In other words, the strong linkages between gender and sexuality, at least in current social practices, are acknowledged even in approaches which disavow their intrinsic connection. Moreover, even though the three subfields have distinctive histories and characteristics, they are by no means entirely discrete. Some writers may explicitly locate their work in more than one subfield. This can, for example, be said of Ken Plummer's work (2005).¹ Such linkages do not exhaust the many interconnections between the subfields. For example, Feminist and Masculinity Studies scholars regularly make use of the insights of sexuality writers, including Queer theorists, in questioning heteronormativity.² While not all sexuality studies are gender focused, and not all gender scholarship attends to sexualities, the ubiquity of the concept of heteronormativity—a term which in some ways parcels norms of sexuality and gender together— draws these literatures into continuing exchanges (Holmes et al 2011).

It should be noted that in some language usages gender and sexuality are not differentiated terms. For example, as we have already indicated in Figure 1.1, in English the term ‘sex’ can refer to sexed (that is, to biological sex and the more recent usage of gender as the social constitution of sexed categorisation) and to sexual (that is, to reproductive and sexual activity as well as to sexualities [Oxford Dictionaries Online 2011]). Indeed, as Nina Lykke points out, there are a number of languages in which particular words may refer to biological sex, socio-cultural gender, and sexuality without distinguishing between these elements (2010: 40–44). Moreover, certain schools of thought within the Gender/Sexuality field simply do not distinguish between gender and sexuality. Psychoanalytic theorists and those influenced by ‘French feminist’ thinkers like Luce Irigaray often use the terms ‘sexuality’ or ‘sex’ to encompass what others would term ‘gender’ (see Jackson 1998: 132).

On these grounds, we argue that any attempt to entirely disengage Feminist, Sexuality, or Masculinity Studies from each other would amount to an impossible dismemberment of existing epistemological linkages. This chapter thus begins with the present engagement between the subfields under the broad rubric of the Gender/Sexuality field: it begins from their existing interconnection and dialogue. The engagement between the subfields contains possibilities, but also points of conflict.

All three subfields within the Gender/Sexuality field have a critical history, in that they start from a critique of the mainstream, ‘the norm’, or that which is taken for granted. Yet although the subfields do share a range of features and are by no means completely discrete—as we have already noted, some writers’ work may be found in more than one location—these subfields also have particular histories that are not commensurable and indeed display important differences. At a simple level, for example, feminist scholars have had an ongoing commitment to foregrounding analysis of the position of women, however this may be understood (Beasley 1999: 18–19). Masculinity scholars have, by contrast, focused upon men/masculinities, and critical Sexuality Studies writers have primarily attended to non-heterosexual sexualities. Where Feminist and Sexuality Studies stand as examples of political thinking that put forward and connect with the marginalised categories they are said to speak for—that is, women and non-heterosexual sexualities—Masculinity Studies writers do not take up the cause of masculinity. A different attitude to their central subject matter is apparent. The subfields also have different approaches towards key terms. For instance, Feminist and Masculinity Studies scholars display a more critical attitude to ‘gender’ than Sexuality Studies writers do towards sexuality. The history and politics of the three subfields’ associations with social movements is also different and, as will become evident in this chapter, the subfields have distinguishable approaches to power and sexuality. What this means is that although the Gender/Sexuality field provides a broad rubric under which Feminist, Masculinity, and Sexuality Studies can be located, these subfields nevertheless cannot be collapsed into one another and must also be understood in terms of their differential trajectories.

To highlight both these shared and differential elements, Beasley (2005) employs the methodological device of a theoretical continuum within the Gender/Sexuality field (see Figure 1.2), ranging from strongly modernist to strongly postmodern thinking. Here the term ‘postmodern’ is employed as a coverall term to include the more specific connotations of poststructuralism (Beasley 2005: 25–27). The continuum shows the ways in which the Feminist, Masculinity, and Sexuality subfields draw upon a broadly similar theoretical terrain and move in similar directions. These main theoretical directions are as follows:

1. (Strong) Modernist Humanism (for example, Martha Nussbaum);

2. Difference (singular)—that is, gender or sexuality as the singular focus (eg from modernist writers like Mary Daly to postmodern thinkers like Elizabeth Grosz);

3. Differences (multiple)—typically gender and race, or sexuality and race (from bell hooks and Frank Rudy Cooper to Gayatri Spivak);

4. Social Constructionism (Raewyn [R.W.] Connell); and

5. (Strong) Postmodernism (from Patrick Califia and Steven Seidman to Judith Butler).

Figure 1.2 Map of the Gender/Sexuality field: theoretical continuum and directions.

This account of a largely shared theoretical landscape within the Gender/Sexuality field enables useful comparison of moments of divergence between the three subfields. Such moments of divergence are highly relevant when considering their accounts of heterosexuality. The crucial point to be made here is that each of the subfields evinces different emphases in relation to these main theoretical directions. The subfields are not, in other words, spread entirely equally across the continuum but rather tend to ‘clump’ differently in certain locations. In this context, although debate about the advantages and limits of postmodern-inflected theories like Queer Theory continues to rage in both Feminist and Sexuality Studies, this debate is still largely emergent in Masculinity Studies. Masculinity Studies, in short, remains generally modernist in approach and has only recently entered the fraught debates associated with challenges to this modernist frame of reference that are now almost ‘old hat’ in Feminist and Sexuality theorising. Indeed, overall, Masculinity Studies remains dominated by a modernist Social Constructionist perspective (number 4 in Figure 1.2). Social Constructionism (in upper case—that is, SC) is a designated label for a particular grouping of modernist thinkers, including thinkers in Gender and Sexuality Studies. The SC approach has a modernist stress upon power as social structures—that is, as macro, foundational, centred, and more or less determining—and is more inclined than postmodern thinking to view power/structures negatively, in terms of oppression. SC writers assert that identities are formed by the social structuring effects of power. However, they stress the historically/culturally specific social variability and complexity of relatively unified subjects rather than emphasising virtually unlimited fluidity as postmodern thinkers are inclined to do. This particular theoretical direction may be distinguished from social constructionism (in lower case—that is, sc), which refers to a broad anti-essentialist stance or strategy, and includes a whole range of perspectives from modernist to postmodern approaches. An instance of this may be found in widespread antagonism to biological essentialism across the continuum (Moon 2008; Beasley 2005: 98–101, 136–38; Gamson and Moon 2004).

Masculinity Studies retains, for the most part, a significant attachment to modernist Social Constructionist modes of theorising, as is evident in the work of Raewyn Connell—whose contribution to the subfield is consistently acknowledged as central by most writers within it (Beasley 2005; Connell 2000, 1987 [see Chapter 5]; Wetherell and Edley 1998). By contrast, Social Constructionism is much diminished in feminist thought and under serious attack in critical sexuality thinking. The prevalence of Social Constructionism in Masculinity Studies—as against in Feminist and Sexuality Studies—highlights the seemingly growing gap between them (Beasley 2009a), a gap which is reflected in their divergent analyses of sexuality.

Since the 1960s/70s, the subfields have aligned in shifting ways. While initially Feminist and Masculinity Studies developed closely linked modernist theoretical paradigms under the rubric of the term ‘gender’, with the rise of postmodern approaches Feminist and Sexuality Studies have moved closer to one another in terms of overarching theoretical frameworks. By contrast, Masculinity Studies has increasingly appeared as the ‘odd man out’. The different trajectories of Feminist, Sexuality, and Masculinity Studies have shifted in relation to their differential uptake of postmodern perspectives. Despite the complex scope of Feminist and Sexuality Studies, their theoretical frameworks and debates display a strong engagement with postmodern thinking (see for example early commentators on this theoretical ‘turn’— Seidman 1994: 2; Barrett 1992: 204). Such an engagement is comparatively absent within Masculinity Studies. This differential uptake has significant implications for the ways in which the three subfields responded to the ‘sex wars’ and consequently for their understandings of heterosexuality.

In brief, three points may be made in support of claims regarding these developments. Firstly, the different trajectories of Feminist, Sexuality, and Masculinity Studies can be seen when comparing central theorists in the three subfields. Judith Butler's work has become a cornerstone of theoretical frameworks within both Feminist and Sexuality Studies—even if her approach is not universally accepted. By contrast, as noted earlier, major theoreticians in Masculinity Studies such as Raewyn Connell remain consistently modernist and highly sceptical concerning postmodern agendas and Butler's work (Connell [1995] 2005: xix; Connell 2002: 71; Connell 2000: 20–21). Moreover, knowledge and use of Butler's work and its complexities remain relatively at the margins within Masculinity Studies theorising and terminologies. Secondly, evidence for the potentially dissonant trajectories of Feminist, Sexuality, and Masculinity Studies may be found in differential adherence to gender categories and gender identities. The now well-established antagonism to the presumed limits of gender categories found in Sexuality Studies is also these days relatively widespread in feminist work. The emphasis of postmodern thinking in Feminist and Sexuality Studies constitutes recourse to identities as upholding fixed conceptions of being, and thus reiterating regulatory regimes. This emphasis, in other words, construes destabilisation of power as destabilisation of identity itself and effectively conceives recourse to identities as politically problematic (Beasley 1999: 95). By contrast, Masculinity Studies writers typically retain certain investments in identities. In this context, Connell conceives power as structural, as macro oppression (‘patriarchy’), imposing upon subjects to produce a hierarchical pyramid of masculine identity groupings (which closely mirrors the hierarchical arrangement of Marxian class groupings). For example, hegemonic masculinity is understood in terms of actual transnational businessmen who are seen as ‘having’ power (Beasley 2009a, 2008a). These are not conceptualisations which display postmodern affiliations.

Thirdly, the different trajectories of Feminist, Sexuality, and Masculinity Studies can be seen in different views of the relationship between gender and sexuality. Theorising in both Feminist and Sexuality Studies now largely takes as given that gender and sexuality cannot be reduced...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Series Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Figures
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• PART I Unpacking the Monolith
• PART II Fields of Practice and Possible Adventures
• Conclusion Theorising Social Change from the Realm of the Dominant
• Notes
• References
• Index