The History Of Sexuality

The sexual behaviors religion deems moral, the levels of scientific understanding in sexual matters and what the media deems sexualy ideal all profoudly influence how a society view and behave with regards to sexuality. For example, if religion being a primary influence in a society deems sexualy activity to only be appropriate between a monogamous, married couple, and should only be talked about between those couples, then it’s likely individuals within that society will hold very conservative views on sex. Additionally, in a society with poor scientific understanding of human sexual behaviour and function, will be a perfect breeding ground for urban myths and misinformation, such as the idea that a woman’s hymen breaks when she loses her virginity. Conversely in a society where media is the primary influencer, of the society promotes and propagates objectifying views of women’s body, it’s more likely that the majority view of sex in that society is that it’s something that’s done by a man to a women, and that giving sex to a man is (or is one of several) a woman’s primary purpose.

The paper written by Kennedy and Davis, which was called The Reproduction of Butch-Fem Roles: A Social Constructionist Approach, provides further evidence that the history of sexuality is young and

Sex. It is everywhere. We see in television shows. In magazines. On the Internet. But sex is still seen as a taboo subject in our society. I believe that being educated about sexuality is vitally important to one health. Understanding one’s body and how it impacts your life. To understand how your beliefs about sexuality and sex have developed one needs to look back over the years and how your beliefs were engrained in your life. This essay will be based on my reflection by looking back on my sexual history on how and what have significantly impacted my development of sexuality. The focus will be on my reflection of answering the sexual history questions and how I have changed and developed over the years. It is important to analyze and reflect to understand how I came to be today, that the past has created my ideas and beliefs about sex and sexuality that have shaped me.

Human sexuality is a common phrase for all, and anything, pertaining to the feelings and behaviors of sex for the human race. Sexuality has been a topic that has been discussed and studied for as far back as 1000 years B.C. and is still being studied today. As the discussion of sexuality has progressed through history, theories have been created based on research and experiments that scholars have implemented, based on their own perceptions of human behavior. Out of the many theories that pose to explain sexual behavior, Sexuality Now explained ten that are seemed to be the most overlapped, and built off of theories. Of these theories, two that were discussed in the text were the behavioral and sociological theory. These two theories cover some of the basic ideas of what could possibly influence a person’s sexuality.

To start with, let's take a type of religion, christianity, and the United States’s society and see how their views of sex are. Since the christian religion is large , I will narrow it down to my christianity, Baptist, in order to avoid conflict with other christian

Discussion of issues related to non-normative sexual and gender identities as related to mental health began in the 19th century (Drescher, 2010). Initially medical and psychiatric providers viewed issues related to gender identity as resulting from delusional thought processes (Drescher, 2010). As a result the concept of surgery as a solution to gender identity differences was viewed as unnecessary and ultimately an incorrect form of treatment (Drescher, 2010). In 1952 the first gender reassignment surgery was performed in Denmark on an American citizen (Drescher, 2010). The publicity in the American media that followed this surgery brought the concept of gender identity to the public eye. During the 1960s research about gender identity started to develop and it was the work of Money, Stoller, Benjamin, and Green that ultimately change professional and public concept of Gender Identity (Drescher, 2010). These four individuals were among the first to conduct clinical and academic research on gender identity and gender roles (Drescher, 2010). As a result of their research beliefs about non-normative gender identity shifted from a problem of the mind to a biological disorder that was fixed and should be treated with

The change in society’s views on sexuality during the 1960s created a moral shift in which people and cultural values shifted away from many traditional biblical ethics. With inspiration from African American and their movements in civil rights, many young women sought to achieve gender equality with males despite the society’s cookie-cutter view of women as housewives in the 1950s. In 1963, Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique as an outlash against the view of the traditional American housewife. Friedan took inspiration from Holocaust survivor Bruno Bettelheim’s analysis of the psychological abuse imposed by the Germans on their prisoners and compared the average suburban home to “comfortable concentration camps” (Wolfe). Alan

Heterosexuality is defined as sexual feeling or behavior directed toward a person or persons of the opposite sex. However, in the early nineteenth century, from 1820 to 1860 the heterosexual did not exist, love back then was represented by “purity” and “romance” and not by lust.The term heterosexuality was developed in the late nineteenth century to denote a universal sexual and cultural norm even though human sexuality was known about for a long time. Human sexuality has been changing throughout history, since early investigations "Contrary to our usual assumption, past Americans and other peoples named, perceived, and socially organized the bodies, lusts, and

Human sexuality is defined as the capability of individuals to experience their sexuality and be able to express themselves as sexual beings (Hyde & DeLameck, 2006). Our interest in this topic is because with time, there has been a change in rules that control human sexual behaviour. The status quo in our contemporary society is much different as compared to an earlier state of conditions, and the change has, as a result, brought the evolvement in human sexuality. People 's view on virginity has changed greatly with a decrease of importance in regards to its preservation. Sexuality is essential to the economic, cultural, social and political organization of society or country. Our sexuality plays a fundamental role in all our lives regardless of age, sex or race. It forms a basic part of our personality and the decisions we make in what we do. One’s sexuality also consumes much of their time through behaviour or thoughts; at times every aspect of our lives seems to revolve around our sexuality. Studying sexuality is very important since human sexuality majorly contributes to social as well as personal problems. A lingering question concerning this topic is to what extent is virginity determined by the status quo and the rules that control human behaviour?

In today’s society things are being expressed and experienced at younger ages, than ever before in our time. Children and teenagers are discovering their sexuality at very early ages. Sexuality is the discovering of who you are and what makes you different from everybody else.

Throughout history, definitions of sexuality within a culture are created and then changed time after time. During these changes, we have seen the impact and power one individual or group can have over others. In the Late Nineteenth Century into the Early Twentieth Century, we see multiple groups of people and or authorities taking control over the idea of sex and how they believe society is being impacted by sex. At this point in time, society had groups of people who believed they had the power to control how society as whole viewed and acted upon sex. Those particular groups and ideas changed many lives and the overall definition of sexuality within that culture.

For years, many scholars have provided many discussions over the topic of gender and sexuality. However, one needs to ask themselves: Are these two topics, gender and sexuality, useful as a category for historical analysis? The articles written by both Joan W. Scott and Afsaneh Najmabadi, answer such a question. By critically examining and assessing their two article, can the usefulness of gender and sexuality as a category for historical analysis be proven.

Known as the Two Sex theory, devised by historian Thomas Laqueur, female sexuality would be characterized purely by a woman’s reproductive potential, where the concept of an innate maternal instinct would become the new prioritized ideal. The female orgasm was renounced by a new essence of masculine superiority. This notion can be asserted with the Phallocentric inclination of the late 18th century, examined by historian Tim Hitchcock, as period characterized by penetration and precedence of the phallus. This “both encouraged and made possible the denigration of female sexuality and perceived passivity.” Consequently this caused the de-emphasis of female sexual pleasure and desire. However, female sexual identity would reemerge with potency, attributed to social flux, the emerging field of sexology and disposition of the interwar years.

The movement of Purity balls is a very interesting and prevalent movement in our society. Many women choose abstinence at a very young age. This choice is made with the encouragement of their fathers. Throughout this essay I will examine religion, as an institution, that governs women’s bodies and sexuality. I will first, describe my opinions on purity balls, secondly, analyze the patriarchal dominance between a father and his daughters, and finally look at some of the redeeming aspects and the consequences of limited knowledge of sexual education.

Throughout history it is evident that human sexuality changes do to religious, governmental and societal influences. The perception of human sexuality has gone through many changes such as being very open and unlabeled activity; to being very “conservative” and a topic that shouldn’t be talked about in public or at all. In any case, human sexuality has always been a topic of interest because humans are sexual beings who want to understand the consciousness of themselves as male or female and see their personal response when encountered in erotic experiences with other individuals. Unlike many other species whose sexual force is strictly for reproduction, human’s sexual drive seems to be driven by many factors that intertwine with each other which leads to very different outcomes. Do to these obscure human emotions and personal gratification, sex is always shown every culture’s art, literature, social norms, and laws.