Introduction

Abstract

The theme of this book is ‘sexualizing the social’. It is concerned with the ways in which various aspects of social life — including employment, family life, representations, politics, identities, and the workings of the law and other bureaucratic organizations — are built on, and themselves build, sexuality. All the chapters show how it is now impossible to consider social life without considering how social relations may be constituted through and by sexuality. They thus bear testiment to the ways in which the sociology of sexuality has moved from occupying a marginal space in the discipline, to its centre (Gagnon, 1994). Indeed, one of the characteristics of contemporary sociology is its focus on sexuality. Many of the core concerns of the discipline — such as the nature of modernity and transformations within late modern societies — are now being examined in terms of sexuality, intimacy and the constitution of sexual identities (see, for example, Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, 1995; Giddens, 1992).

With thanks to Diana Leonard for her editorial suggestions.