Chapter 1
Letâs talk about sex, baby
At the bottom of the page she had written ⌠BEWARE OF FOUCAULT, as if the philosopher was a particularly savage dog.1
âThe best orgasm of your life!â, âHow to reach orgasm every single time!â, âWhen itâs ok to fake itâ. For more than three decades now, articles in womenâs magazines have urged young women to discover (or, more precisely, perform) heterosexual sexual bliss. But sex advice columns do much more than that. By reproducing a mode of very familiar sex talk, they enable us to listenâcourtesy of a feminist adaptation of Gramsciâs theory of hegemonyâto the sounds of hegemonic heterosexism clanking into gear. The neverending stream of advice to young women on how to be properly sexed, sexual and prepped to please their man also supplies a rich body of material for breachingâcourtesy of Foucaultâthe self-evidence of âsexâ. Indeed, magazines like Cosmopolitan, Cleo or She cry out for Foucauldian discourse analysis; that is, for testing Foucaultâs famous assertion in volume 1 of his History of Sexuality that what matters, when it comes to sex, is not âwhether one says yes or no to sexâ, or âwhether one formulates prohibitions or permissions, whether one asserts its importance or denies its effects, or whether one refines the words one uses to designate itâ. What matters is to account for the fact that sex is spoken about and to discover:
⌠who does the speaking, the positions and viewpoints from which they speak, the institutions which prompt people to speak about it and which store and distribute the things that are said. What is at issue, briefly, is the over-all âdiscursive factâ, the way in which sex is âput into discourseâ.2
What matters, in short, is how sex is talked about. For Foucault and Foucauldians, sexâand by extension, violence and crimeâare first and foremost discursive practices. It follows that checking how sex, violence and crime are âput into discourseâ is this bookâs method of choice for planting them firmly in a postmodern frame.
Some caveats before we begin. This book does not have space to explore the development of what has been called, after Foucault, the âpostmodernisationâ or denaturalisation of sex.3 Engaging with the massive body of âprosex thoughtâ inspired by Foucaultâs three-volume history of sexuality is simply beyond its reach.4 Nor can we spare the time to get immersed in the equally voluminous feminist debates for and against the deployment of his ideas for feminist ends.5 My more minimalist goal is to create a usable Foucault, a Foucault amenable to anyone interested in forging a critical understanding of sex and sexed violence. Naturally, the first question that springs to mind is: how much sex do we need for that? Some may say they cannot get enough, but we need enough to grasp Foucaultâs reconceptualisation of sexuality as a discursively constituted event involving a technology or technique of the self.6 And we need enough to comprehend what Rosalind Coward meant when she declared that every manifestation of sexual activity, including male aggression, far from being ânaturalâ, is a âritualistic enactment of cultural meanings about sexâ. Sex, she said, is ânever instinctualâ â sex is âalways an activity wrapped in cultural meanings, cultural prescriptions and cultural constraintsâ.7 Drawing on these insights, Chapter 1 takes the first small steps needed to inculcate a postmodern feminist sensibility around questions of sex in order to lay the groundwork for the challenges made to non-feminist perspectives on menâs violence against women in the next three chapters. It also aims to disabuse readers of the notion that âRadical feminism is feminismâ as non-feminists appear to assume is still the case today.8
The coming of soul-less sex
Let us begin with an illuminating early twenty-first century magazine discussion of âmodernâ sex. The October 2003 British edition of Cosmopolitan sets itself apart from the madding crowd of glossy womenâs magazines that have urged young women, in issue after issue, onto better and better heterosexual sex. Remembering the (undisclosed) time of her âfirst proper boyfriendâ, a time when she and her girlfriends ârelished our newfound sexual powerâ, the editorâa self-declared âmodern-day feministâ â reflects on the ânew worrying trendâ she calls âSoul-less Sexâ. While âsoul-less sexâ is not defined in the editorial, it soon becomes apparent that it is code for the recent much-publicised spectacle of young English women drinking themselves into comas, acquiring sexual transmitted diseases at alarmingly high rates in the process, and topping the European teenage pregnancy scales at a rate of two, three and six times more than their Italian, French and German counterparts respectively.9 The editor blames these worrying new trends on âsoul-less sexâ, which is âthe oppositeâ of the âopen approach to female sexualityâ that the editor had enjoyed when she was younger, which if one can guess from her photograph was some 10 years earlier. Back then, she says:
We didnât feel ashamed about one-night stands, we didnât judge each other and we werenât embarrassed by our enjoyment of sex. This, we thought, is what feminism is all about.
Moreover, it was magazines like Cosmo that had âhelped make this proud sexuality possibleâ:
Along with millions of other women, we felt able to expect satisfying sex. We didnât always get it, but we knew we deserved it (unlike our mothers and grandmothers).
Now something had gone awry. Feminism was supposed to mean âmore choices in all areas of our livesâ. The arrival of soul-less sex, however, was a headache for the editor of âthe only magazine that gives women open and entertaining sexual adviceâ. Certainly, the behaviour of young women obsessed with sex with men they did not know which had caught the British mediaâs attention was worrying, but not â she assures usâbecause she had an issue with âthe number of men a woman chooses to bedâ. The problem was rather that young women âfeel they must be part of this new trendâ; that they âfeel pressured because suddenly sex is the cool, fashionable thing to doâ.10
Our worried Cosmo editor taps into a question that has been posed by feminist analysts for some time nowâjust how sexually liberating for women is all this magazine sex talk? Have all the hints on how to have seamless orgasmic sex âevery single timeâ failed to live up to their promise? One view is that magazines aimed at young women should not be admonished for trying to turn their readers into âpassive clones of male desireâ, because âif you actually take the trouble to read magazines like Cleo, Cosmo or Dolly, you get a very different pictureâ.11 Well, do you? In this chapter, I do take the trouble to read the magazines. I also take up the challenge of taming the savage dogâthe challenge of rendering Foucaultâs frequently difficult, sometimes convoluted, and occasionally circular theories about the power of discourses less scary to the uninitiated. We will pick up more methodological clues from Foucault for studying the power of discourse in Chapter 3. Here we are concerned with developing a Foucauldian reading of discourses about sexâpredominantly sex as in having sex. Finally, a brief reference to sex as in having a sex will serve as a reminder of just how complex âsexâ is.
Sex and methodâtaming the beast
Some readers might prefer to bypass questions of method in order to get straight down to businessâthe business of sex. It may be a matter of indifference to them that Foucault wrote a great deal about methodology, as well as about sexuality. No doubt they will be relieved to learn that as this book is not a methodological tract, it will not be delving into the detail of Foucaultâs notes on method. Nor will it get side-tracked by the extensive literature assessing his history of sexuality. As already mentioned, the heated debates between his feminist admirers and detractors, between those who have followed and those who have adamantly declined to follow any of the Foucauldian paths are not our concern here either.12 Instead, this chapter explores reading strategies for those interested in taking what is sometimes called âthe postmodern turnâ.
Expanding on the question of terminological confusion between postmodernism and poststructuralism that was raised in the introduction, let us begin with a discussion of these terms that takes place within a criminology text. According to Maggie Wykes, criminology has experienced a âcritical turnâ that âblended feminism with post-modernism, particularly with the post-structural philosophical aspects of post-modernismâ. She sees this distinction between postmodernism and poststructuralist theories as crucial inasmuch as âpost-modern critiqueâ, in her view, âmerely celebrates a frivolous kind of dismissal of all attempts to account for change in the worldâ. Poststructuralism, on the other hand, challenges objective truth because it recognises that power is imbricated in the production of truth; that regimes of truth are forged from a âwill to powerâ. Such an understanding, she says, is âepitomisedâ by Foucaultâs work.13 That Foucault himself not only refused this label, but insisted that he did not know what the terms âpostmodernismâ, âstructuralismâ or âpoststructuralismâ meant, is of no consequence.14 What is pertinent however, is that a clear exposition of poststructuralism and of how Foucaultâs work fits the description, can be found in Chris Weedonâs ground-breaking book advocating the usefulness of poststructuralist theory for feminist practice.
Poststructuralism, Weedon explains, is the name given to theoretical positions developed from the work of Derrida, Lacan, Kristeva, Althusser and Foucault. Its âfounding insightâ is that âlanguage, far from reflecting an already given social reality, constitutes social reality for usâ. This âinsightâ, as she calls it, is the very heart of the matter, the key to unlocking the postmodern door. Discourses give the world meaning; they do not simply translate a given or âfixed realityâ. For example, what it means to be a woman, or a man, is not constant, fixed, essential or eternal. Rather, âthe meanings of femininity and masculinityâ vary across time and between cultures. But while all poststructuralist theories agree on this pointâthat âmeaning is constituted within languageâ rather than being a givenâdifferent forms of poststructuralism theorise the production of meaning in different ways. Derridean deconstruction, for example, looks at the relationships between different texts. In Weedonâs view, however, it is Foucauldian theory, with its analytical focus on historically specific discursive relations and social practices, that is âof most interest to feministsâ.15
Discourse, it should be made clear from the start, is not interchangeable with âlanguageâ. A âcritical conceptâ that refuses the âsupposed given unity of particular domains of knowledgeâ, âdiscourseâ has been defined as âa system of language, objects and practicesâ, one that âimplies a practice both of speech and action; who, it asks, speaks on a particular object or event and when, where and how?â.16 Discursive practices can be economic, social and political. As Weedon explains, Foucault used the concept of âdiscursive fieldâ to explore the relationship between language, social institutions, subjectivity and power. Discursive fields consist of âcompeting ways of giving meaning to the world and of organising social institutions and processesâ. Law, the political system, the church, the family, the education system and the media are all located in a particular discursive field. Within each field, some discourses support the status quo, while others contest it, and are consequently âdismissed by the hegemonic system of meanings and practices as irrelevant or badâ. This is the fate, for example, of dissenting discourses such as feminism that seek to challenge dominant or âhegemonicâ discourses.17
What is distinctive about Foucaultâs approach is his linking of discourse and power and his emphasis on the social and institutional effects of discourse, especially its role in âthe constitution and government of individual subjectsâ â that is, of who we are. Power, he argued, was exercised on individuals not only through institutions such as psychiatry and the penal system, but also via âthe discursive production and control of sexualityâ. It followed that the analytical focus should be on the discursive fields which constitute madness, or punishment of sexuality. The aim in each case is to âuncover the particular regimes of power and knowledge at work in a society and their part in the overall production and maintenance of existing power relationsâ. Discourses are crucial to Foucault in the establishment of regimes of truth because, as Weedon explains, they are âways of constituting knowledge, together with the social practices, forms of subjectivity and power relations which inhere in such knowledges and the relations between themâ. But discourses are âmore than ways of thinking and producing meaningâ. They also constitute:
⌠the ânatureâ of the body, unconscious and conscious mind and emotional life of the subjects they seek to govern. Neither the body nor thought and feelings have meaning outside their discursive articulation, but the ways in which discourse constitutes the minds and bodies of individuals is always part of a wider network of power relations, often with institutional bases.18
In short, discourses are powerful, some much more than others, as we shall see. For now, Foucault gets the last word on the power of discourseâdiscourse, he said, is âthe power to be seizedâ.19
Sex, discourse and the power of truth
As it happens, sex is a very good place to start discussing the method that Foucault himself referred to, at least on one occasion, as âdiscourse analysisâ, a method that treats discourse not as âa set of lin...