Essentialist Perspective On Sexual Conformity

Mothers, fathers, daughters, sons, aunts, uncles, grandparents, pimps, prostitutes, straight people, gay people, lesbian people, Europeans, Asians, Indians, and Africans all have once thing in common: they are products of sexuality. Sexuality is the most common activity in the world, yet is considered taboo and “out of the norm” in modern society. Throughout history, people have been harassed, discriminated against, and shunned for their “sexuality”. One person who knows this all too well is activist and author, Angela Davis. From her experiences, Davis has analyzed the weakness of global society in order to propose intellectual theories on how to change the perspective of sexuality. This research paper will explore the discussions of

From birth, one's sexuality is shaped by society. Cultures institute behaviors that are to be seen as the societal norms, which work to constantly reinforce societal expectations of how genders should act in relation to one another. Although some may argue that one's sexuality is an innate characteristic resulting from genetic makeup, there is a large amount of evidence pointing to its social construction instead. Through the power differences between males and females, established gender roles, and drastic economic shifts, society establishes sexuality and reinforces the behaviors that are expected of its citizens.

As a society, we feed off of each other for what a proper response to something may be. As children, we first look to see our mother’s reaction after falling down; if she is calm, I should also be. We look to each other for what a definition of things should be, as well. In the 1950’s, it was generally obscene for a woman on television to show her belly button, whereas today we will show nude breasts on primetime programming. This follows the sociological theory of symbolic interactionism, where society and individual social interaction provides a subjective meaning to deviant behavior. Many social definitions change for the better, however some change for the worse. One such example was once viewed as normal, with no second thoughts given to it, but now is seen as an actual social problem affecting some groups aversely. This is the topic of homosexuality, a subject that has been on the receiving end of both accepting and discriminating cultures for thousands of years.

Ideas about sex, gender and homosexuality have been changing rapidly over the past several decades in the United States. There are several obvious reasons for this. The primary one is legal: various legal decisions by the United States Supreme Court have altered existing law on the subject of sex and homosexuality, and substantially affected matters of gender as expressed in law. But there has also been a social shift driven by medicine, largely based on response to the AIDS epidemic at its height in the 1980s and 1990s, but also in terms of other medical matters such as contraception and abortion.

Gender, race, age, and ability have been used to shape the history and our understanding of human sexuality, as well as how certain groups, specifically marginalized groups, were seen as degenerate or delinquent people. When examining why and how specific groups of people were though of as being sexual delinquents, it is important to use an intersectional lens, and consider how these different categories and identities of gender, race, age, and ability work together to form experiences and opinions. By marginalizing, controlling, and regulating the sexualities and bodies of those who were women, people of colour, adolescents, or differentially abled, the social norm of a white, heterosexual, patriarchy has been enforced through history.

In society, heterosexuality is a principal method of organizing institutions and regulating individual behavior. A culture based on ideas of heterosexuality values relationships that are between men and women; as a result, sexual contact occurring between same sex individuals is seen as deviant and labeled as homosexual. In her book, Ward explains how straight white men can have sex with other white men while retaining their heterosexuality in addition to gaining a masculine appeal. Ingraham and Namaste’s discussion of heteronormativity, heterogenders, and supplementarity aids in understanding why straight white men are not labeled as homosexual and how this functions to reproduce inequalities based on race, gender, and sexuality.

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.

Allison and Risman pose the question of whether or not females face harsh standards of sexual activity. Allison and Risman created blind studies as well as randomly sampled surveys to create three distinct hypotheses on societal sexual attitudes. The individual research hypothesis states members of a religious community or heterosexual students frown upon hooking up frequently, by both males and females. The interaction level hypothesis states that affiliations, such as Greek life and athletics, create a double standard for women who hook up frequently. I plan on using Allison and Risman’s research to validate the belief that hookup culture has become normal and there is a double standard for women who hookup frequently.

Sociologists can analyze the most important aspects of life such as, love, romance, intimacy, marriage and family. My one piece of media is a song by Beyoncé called “Cater 2 U.” The song is about letting your man know that you appreciate his hard work and showing that it is the women’s job is to temporarily take the stress away. Heterosexual imaginary of appreciation is viewed in the song “Cater 2 U” by the emphasis on feeding the man. The heterosexual imaginary about relationships focus on pleasing a man by cooking dinner. Stevi Jackson a sociologist states, Heteronormativity standardizes gender performances and expands outside of just the assumption that everyone is heterosexual. Heteronormativity gives a standard for what’s expected for a certain gender. The social structure of gender is constructed through women who cannot cook are viewed as undesirable to men. Also, women who do not keep themselves looking attractive for a man, society views that as deal breaker for why a man would leave you. An example from the song Cater 2 U, “I’ll keep it tight, I 'll keep my figure right I 'll keep, My Hair Fixed,” ” this exactly shows us a glimpse of the heterosexual imaginary of women. These things are what women perceive as what a relationship should be. Most men are not viewed as this shallow, when it comes to what they want it is pretty simple. Some women cannot see because of all these social norms,

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?

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.

The heterosexual imaginary is immensely ingrained in our everyday experience that most people, including feminist sociologists, has become inclined to conceptualize and theorize based around the heteronormative. The heterosexual imaginary acts as an invisible framework at play that structures our thinking processes and in which constructs our social identity. For instance, the inquiry of a survey taker’s marital status in most social science surveys come to show that our recognized and appropriate social identity is formed around heterosexuality. That is, any deviation from this heterosexual norm would be considered abnormal and be marginalized. To a minimal extent, this focus has served the interests of women because of the lack of activism

The Sociological Imagination was a term that was first coined by sociologist C. Wright Mills. It could be said that definition of The Sociological Imagination is having the ability to look beyond personal experience and realise that society is shaped by the cross over between biography and history. Mills thought that everyone in society had the capability to think sociologically and that this was essential to gain a deeper understanding of both their society, and their current circumstance. This approach contradicts a more readily adopted approach by the public that sociologists call “The common sense approach”. The common sense approach is a collection of knowledge that has been acquired through little scientific merit, such as: personal experience, gossip or anecdotal evidence. This essay will discuss and explain the difference between the Sociological Imagination and Common-Sense explanations through the use of examples to explain the topic of sexuality.

Girls & Sex by Peggy Orenstein portrays teenage sexuality as anything but light-hearted. While the title would lead a person to believe that the book is all about girls’ sexuality, it is not. Sexuality among todays teen seems to be more focused on boys than girls. Today’s teenage culture is what is known as a “hook-up” culture. This hook-up culture seems to be driving teenagers into impersonal relationships consisting of various sexual acts. This book is a must read for educators, mothers, fathers, Aunts, Uncles, and so on, but be forewarned, the information that girls have shared with the author as she interviewed more than seventy young women between the ages of fifteen and twenty (Orenstein, P., 2016), can be alarming to anyone who is not yet aware of this culture.

Before I entered this class, my imagination about what sociology is wasn’t of what it came to be after this class ended. First of all, before coming to this class, I didn’t know that prostitution was a social problem. I understand that being a prostitute is a sin, however I don’t think that a person should be punished by a society for being a prostitute. In other words, I thought that if a person is making money on his or her own body, it wouldn’t be a societal problem. Coming in this class, I have the knowledge that gay, lesbians or any other sexual orientation that isn’t heterosexuality was something that only exists in one’s mind and that if a person want to change their sexual orientation, he or she could. Therefore, in this class, after learning about sexual orientation, I accepted that people are born different and as society we should all accept that. Sexual orientation somehow I feel should require more large-scale intervention. In a lot places, LGBT people are discriminated. If God only created female and a male and that they only should be attracted to each other, let him only judge those whose feelings are different from what the bible states.