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dissertations on asexuality??


isabella

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Do we have any people in doctoral programs who have considered writing about asexuality in their dissertation? I'm just curious, as I am a doctoral student.

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O.K. I think that I will ask another variation of this question.

I am an English Literature student. What if I were to write a dissertation about asexuality in literature? Does it seem like a good or a bad idea? Any opinions from anyone?

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bard of aven

Sounds like a great idea. Is there enough of it for a dis?

boa

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I think it would be, if nothing else, a difficult undertaking. I know of very little that may even be vaguely construed as asexuality in most literature I've read.

As a matter of fact, I can think of only one instance in my English education in which I have encountered a character that may be considered asexual. In Fielding's Tom Jones the villainous Blifil is a man completely without desires, without compassion or any real emotion, and, especially when compared to the very raunchy protagonists, very lacking in sexual desire. It was Fielding's belief that a man who has no desires of any kind cannot be trusted, and so he made his villain essentially asexual.

If you can find other instances of asexuality in literature, even negative ones, I think that it could be interesting to explore these depictions of human asexuality and what it means about the societies the works were composed in, and how that compares with some modern interpretation of asexuality.

But like I said, unless you've been paying close attention to asexuality in literature, I think that finding much of anything would be a long and frustrating hunt, with no certainity of a fruitful outcome.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Yes, I think that there are a number of difficulties involved with a dissertation on asexuality in the field of English Studies.

However, I would love it if someone would do a dissertation on asexuality because people often have their dissertations published, and it could be the beginning of scholarly work on asexuality.

Are there any psychology, sociology, women's studies, queer theorists etc. etc. etc. who are doctoral students and would want to take on such a topic? At least I could live vicariously through one of you ...

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English student here with interests in women's studies and queer theory, but I'm just an undergrad college student. And a lazy one at that. :)

I have a friend (I think he goes by the name "mikey" here) who has been working on the beginnings of what may be a very interesting research project on human asexuality, but as far as I know it's still in its earliest stages.

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  • 3 months later...

I have a BSc (Hons) in Psychology and Journalism, and I'm a freelance writer. My dissertation specialised in the sexual content in teenage magazines, which is shocking. Currently thinking of doing a Masters in asexuality, but I'm not sure what university would accept that, or indeed, what subject department.

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  • 3 months later...

Chiming in very late here (I just joined the forum). As an English doctoral student, I think a diss. on asexuality would be fascinating. I've never heard of anything like it, despite all the work done in queer theory and gender studies.

I think one could make an argument that if asexuality means not feeling sexual attraction, then asexuality in women could be read as an assumption of much of 19th century British lit. (I'm limiting myself to Brit. because that's what I've studied more.)

For example, does Elizabeth fall in love with Darcy because she think he's hot or because she increasingly comes to admire the person? (Could be both, of course!) Another way of asking the question is: does Jane Austen give us any textual evidence that Elizabeth is sexually attracted to Darcy?

What about Frankenstein? It's a very passionate book, but is it sexually passionate? On my last read through, I was struck by the "slashiness," as the fan-fickers would say, of the relationship between Frankenstein and Walton. Walton seems so truly in love with F. But if this relationship--on the basis of no textual evidence--can be read as sexualized, it can also be read as love without sexual attraction. Similarly, do we have textual evidence that sexual attraction is important between Frankenstein and Elizabeth? It seems to me that in this book, there's an intriguing conflation of sexual love and friendship. Elizabeth (and Clerval) is to Frankenstein much as Frankenstein is to Walton. Queer theory would, I think, tend to read this as sexualizing the F/W relationship, but it could as easily be read as desexualizing the E/F relationship. (All of this, I expect, is linked to Shelley's attempts to place the men and women on the same spiritual level. And I am reminded that Mary Wollstonecraft, if I recall, said that sexual attraction is fleeting and that marriage works if viewed as an institution between friends.)

Anyway, I say, go for the dissertation!

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hi, i'm writing an undergrad on asexuality right now (due in tomorrow eek!) and am hoping to take it further into a doctorate.

I'm writing about how the emergence of asexuality challenges the dominant idea that we are all either utterly sexual or somehow maladjusted biologically and/or psychologically, because being asexual just isnt a disorder that makes you depressed but something that one can live with reasonably happily (or could if everyone would stop going on about sex all the damned time).

I'm arguing that the whole of cultural/social theory to date is wrong, because it puts too much emphasis on how our behaviour is biologically influenced by our sexuality. sexuality should in fact only be a small part of human existence but our society has made it into such a big deal that we all actually think its this massive important part of who we really are. if you look at how many millions of articles there are on improving your sex drive, all the products to increase your libido, all the therapy for problems with supposed frigidity etc, you realise that actually people DON'T want that much sex. they just now think its because there's something WRONG with them instead of realising that sex just isn't the be-all and end-all of being a person (I'm not talking about fully asexual people there but all the people who don't mind sex but don't crave it and think they should to be normal).

For the academics among you, I'm using theories of Freud, Marx, Marcuse, Laing, Foucault, Butler, and others. I point out that the focus on sex which has increased over the last forty years is not in fact because we are becoming less repressed and this is the TRUE, SEXUAL side of humanity emerging - in fact this rampant sexuality being rammed down our throats is capitalism's response to the sexual revolution - a way of containing rebellion against the system by giving us what we think we want which actually isn't sexual freedom but autonomous freedom to experience the whole of human potential. We think society has beome more liberal. Nonsense. It enslaves us in new ways whilst making us think we are being liberated. I can shag around but I can't give up my job, even though progress means we can now produce enough food to feed the world. Theres no profit in feeding the world, so you gotta keep me working. Give me sex and tv instead.

Anyway, rambling now and sounding like a communist!

Hope that sounds interesting - I know its a bit radical and so I hope noone's offended. Theres not room here to fully explain all my ideas and I don't want to get boring, but in sum I'm not saying sexual identity isn't a big deal, it is, but I'm saying it shouldn't be the whole deal as to what defines a person and a society. Its only a small part of our potential as a species. And asexual people show us why its wrong to think sex is what makes us most human.

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hilbertastronaut
in fact this rampant sexuality being rammed down our throats is capitalism's response to the sexual revolution - a way of containing rebellion against the system by giving us what we think we want which actually isn't sexual freedom but autonomous freedom to experience the whole of human potential. We think society has beome more liberal. Nonsense. It enslaves us in new ways whilst making us think we are being liberated.

Amen. Please post your thesis! i'd like to read it and get inspired!

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TeddyMiller
I am an English Literature student. What if I were to write a dissertation about asexuality in literature? Does it seem like a good or a bad idea? Any opinions from anyone?

Could you include science fiction in that? There are science fiction stories involving asexual aliens and androids and so on, who may find human sexuality baffling.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I agree. I would be great to read your paper. If you're worried about posting it on a public forum due to plagiarism issues, perhaps PMs would work?

For the academics among you, I'm using theories of Freud, Marx, Marcuse, Laing, Foucault, Butler, and others. I point out that the focus on sex which has increased over the last forty years is not in fact because we are becoming less repressed and this is the TRUE, SEXUAL side of humanity emerging - in fact this rampant sexuality being rammed down our throats is capitalism's response to the sexual revolution - a way of containing rebellion against the system by giving us what we think we want which actually isn't sexual freedom but autonomous freedom to experience the whole of human potential. We think society has beome more liberal. Nonsense. It enslaves us in new ways whilst making us think we are being liberated. I can shag around but I can't give up my job, even though progress means we can now produce enough food to feed the world. Theres no profit in feeding the world, so you gotta keep me working. Give me sex and tv instead.

Well said. I feel like I can hear the Foucault influence coming through. I was thinking about Foucault the other day--I don't know much about his personal life, but I think it's interesting that a "gay" person was the one to become (in)famous for stating that "homosexuality" didn't exist before 1870 or whenever. That seems to me to be the statement of someone who really did not like being put in those categorical boxes. Yes, it would be nice to see a little less proliferation of sexual discourse and little more getting on with our lives.

(Funny though. Bringing "asexuality" into the open is actually adding to the proliferation of discourses.... Hm....)

I haven't heard of Laing. What's his/her position?

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yes R. D. Laing

existentialist psychiatrist from 60's who disliked traditional psychiatry - worked with people with various kinds of 'mental health problems'. wanted to meet people where they were at and properly come to understand them and the nature of their suffering, if indeed they WERE suffering and we didn't just assume that because they were different (think of one flew over the cuckoos nest, he thought psychiatry was like this and it horrified him)

he's another writer who thought that allowing people to express their true sexuality could set them free from civilisation's over-control of what they were allowed to experience, but over time this has been mistaken as meaning that he believed total constant sex would set them free, when probably he meant de-institionalising people's sexuality and allowing it to be a private thing which they could express, or not, depending on what was right for them, rather than something that was controlled and administered by social rules.

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Interesting. The name R. D. Laing is coming back to me now. Reminds me a bit of what I dimly remember of Marcuse. This sounds like a great collection of thinkers to explore.

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