Queer Activism, Citizenship, and the Age of Consent
Why aren’t gay, lesbian, trans, and queer people full citizens in law? This question enraged gay activists in 1990s Britain. The HIV/AIDS...
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JOANNA BOURKE
Blogs
Here are my latest blogs! Enjoy.
Apr 241 min read
Shameless! (just a few of the 'star' speakers)
The SHaME project have talked to some incredible people who reflect on sexual violence and ways to create rape-free worlds. You can...
190
Apr 241 min read
Shameless! Festival of Activism Against Sexual Violence
The events I have enjoyed most in connection with the SHaME project were our two Shameless! Festivals of Activism Against Sexual...
60
Apr 241 min read
SHaME: Sexual Harms and Medical Encounters
For five and a half years, I have been privileged to work with the SHaME team at Birkbeck. It has been the most intellectually rewarding...
70
Feb 520 min read
Cruelty to Animals
Jean-Honoré Fragonard’s ‘Girl Making a Dog Dance on Her Bed’ was painted in the late 1760s. The painting is typical of his decadent...
30
Feb 521 min read
A (very short) Global History of Sexual Violence
This is a short piece from my book, Disgrace (Reaktion Books, 2022) Sexual violence: it is a difficult subject to talk about. There is...
70
Feb 524 min read
Sex Work: A History
To whom does a woman’s body belong? In mid-nineteenth century Britain, this question provoked impassioned debates between moralists,...
40
Feb 520 min read
Abstinence: A History
Is sex a ‘good thing’? Is celibacy dangerous? How can we understand the explosive violence of Incels, those young men (primarily) whose...
10
Feb 518 min read
Monogamy: A History
Why is monogamy such a big deal? What can a history of fidelity and infidelity reveal about the changing rights, duties, and social...
10
Feb 520 min read
Pornography: A History
Pornography is divisive. It is guaranteed to incite heated debates between people inhabiting different subject positions based on...
60
Feb 520 min read
Sexual Perversion: A History
What do we mean when we talk about the ‘perversions’? Who gets to decide what is ‘normal’ or ‘abnormal’? The concept of ‘perversion’ is...
130
Feb 519 min read
Sexual Pleasure: A History
Throughout human history, sexual danger has regulated social lives and subjectivities. From the ‘yellow press’ of the late nineteenth...
110
Jan 76 min read
Breast Cancer: A History
Suddenly feeling a lump in one’s breast is terrifying, yet it is an experience suffered by one in every eight women in Britain and...
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Jan 35 min read
Sexual Assault: The Courtroom
Review of Heather R. Hlavka and Sameena Mulla’s Bodies in Evidence. Race, Gender, and Science in Sexual Assault Adjudication (New York:...
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