Mimi Schippers
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781479801596
- eISBN:
- 9781479895342
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479801596.003.0005
- Subject:
- Sociology, Marriage and the Family
The author argues that compulsory monogamy is not just about relationship form, but also translates into the normalization and strict enforcement of dyadic sex as the only legitimate kind of sexual ...
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The author argues that compulsory monogamy is not just about relationship form, but also translates into the normalization and strict enforcement of dyadic sex as the only legitimate kind of sexual interaction. To the extent that the only normative way to have sex is in pairs, compulsory monogamy fixes (1) sexual orientation as defined by the gender of the object of one’s desire and (2) the phenomenological embodiment of gendered subjectivity within temporally and spatially bounded erotic interactions. The author introduces the threesome imaginary as a mononormative, collective fantasy of non-dyadic sexual interactions and as a structuring feature of the sexual field and erotic habitus. By contrasting the heteromasculine fantasy of a threesome with two women with a polyqueer fantasy of a threesome involving a woman and two men, the author probes how erotic threesomes involving two straight men and one woman offer a phenomenological opportunity to queer the embodiment of heteromasculinity and shift the sexual field in ways that will transform the heteromasculine and heterofeminine erotic habitus.Less
The author argues that compulsory monogamy is not just about relationship form, but also translates into the normalization and strict enforcement of dyadic sex as the only legitimate kind of sexual interaction. To the extent that the only normative way to have sex is in pairs, compulsory monogamy fixes (1) sexual orientation as defined by the gender of the object of one’s desire and (2) the phenomenological embodiment of gendered subjectivity within temporally and spatially bounded erotic interactions. The author introduces the threesome imaginary as a mononormative, collective fantasy of non-dyadic sexual interactions and as a structuring feature of the sexual field and erotic habitus. By contrasting the heteromasculine fantasy of a threesome with two women with a polyqueer fantasy of a threesome involving a woman and two men, the author probes how erotic threesomes involving two straight men and one woman offer a phenomenological opportunity to queer the embodiment of heteromasculinity and shift the sexual field in ways that will transform the heteromasculine and heterofeminine erotic habitus.
