Women, Sexuality and the Political Power of Pleasure Sex, Gender and Empowerment

by Cornwall, Andrea; Jolly, Susie; Hawkins, Kate

• ISBN13: 9781780325729
• ISBN10: 178032572X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2013-07-23
• Publisher: UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS

Summary

This pioneering collection explores the ways in which women's sexual desires are experienced by them and how this experience effects women's empowerment. It shows that an exploration of pleasure can have a hugely positive impact for women at the personal, social and political levels.

Traditional gender and development discourses tend to engage with sexuality in relation to violence and ill-health. Although this has been hugely important in challenging violence against women, over emphasizing these negative aspects has subsumed women's sexualities under violence, danger and fear. The media, the pharmaceutical market, pornography and the market more broadly on the other hand celebrate the pleasures of sex in ways that can be just as oppressive, often implying that only certain types of (young, heterosexual, able-bodied, HIV negative) people are 'eligible' for sexual pleasure.

The book brings together challenges to these strictures and exclusions from both south and north of the globe. It demonstrates both conceptually and through examples of mobilisation, programming and policy, how positive approaches to pleasure and sexuality can enhance equality and empowerment for all.

Author Biography

Andrea Cornwall is a political anthropologist who specializes in the anthropology of democracy, citizen participation, participatory research, gender and sexuality. She has worked on topics ranging from understanding women's perspectives on family planning, fertility and sexually transmitted infection in Nigeria and Zimbabwe, public engagement in UK regeneration programs, the quality of democratic deliberation in new democratic spaces in Brazil, the use and abuse of participatory appraisal in Kenya, domestic workers' rights activism in Brazil and sex workers' rights activism in India.

Susie Jolly is Convenor of the Sexuality and Development Programme at the Institute of Development Studies. The programme supports exchanges between sexual rights activists, and helps share their insights with people in the development industry. Susie's recent publications include Jolly, S. (2010) 'Why the development industry should get over its obsession with bad sex and start to think about pleasure' in Lind, A. and Bergeron, S. (eds), Development, Sexual Rights and Global Governance: Resisting Global Power, Routledge and Cornwall, A, Correa, S. and Jolly, S. (2008) Development with a Body: Sexuality, Human Rights and Development, London: Zed Books. 
 
Kate Hawkins is convenor of the Sexuality and Development Programme at the Institute of Development Studies. Kate has extensive experience in research, writing, communications and advocacy on sexual and reproductive health and rights and HIV at UK, European and international level. She has a particular focus on the sexual and reproductive rights of marginalised groups and the research to policy and practice process. Kate is currently communications and research officer for the Realising Sexual and Reproductive Rights Research Programme Consortium led by IDS.

Table of Contents

Introduction - The Power of Pleasure; Susie Jolly
PART I: WHY TALK ABOUT PLEASURE?
1. Pleasure and Women's Empowerment; Dr. Bibi Bakare Yusuf
2. Reaffirming Pleasure in a World of Dangers; Professor Rosalind Petchesky
3. The Importance of Positive Approaches to Sexuality in Tackling Sexual Violence; Dr. Chi-Chi Undie
4. Desires Denied; Dr. Alice Welbourn
5. Mobile Love Videos Make Me Feel Healthy: Rethinking ICTs in Development; Indira Maya Ganesh
6. Pornography as Sex Education in Rural Bangladesh; Dr. Sabina Faiz Rashid
PART II: HOW TO TALK ABOUT PLEASURE: SEXUALITY TRAINING AND EDUCATION
7. Sexual Pleasure as a Women's Human Right; Pinar Ilkkaracan
8. Better Sex and More Equal Relationships: Couple Training in Nigeria; Dorothy Akenova
9. Do Chinese Women Want Sex? Building a Sexual Rights Movement in China; Dr. Xiaopei He
10. Training Women's Rights NGOs to Work on Sexuality; Jaya Sharma
PART III: MAKING SPACE FOR PLEASURE IN POLICY AND PRACTICE
11. Why Perfect Sex is Bad for Us; Dr. Petra Boynton
12. Sexual Rights in Action: Examples from the International Planned Parenthood Foundation (IPPF); Gill Greer
13. Enabling Disabled People to Have and Enjoy the Kind of Sexuality They Want; Lorna Couldrick
14. How was it for you? Pleasure and Performance in Sex Work; Dr. Jo Doezema
15. Working with the Adult Entertainment Industry - The Pleasure Project, UK/India
16. Is Laughter Like an Orgasm?; Ana Francis Mor