Agnes Andeweg, Robert Davidson, Gert Hekma, “Sexual Revolutions! Three Innovative Perspectives on an International Landslide”
Wednesday, 21 October 2015, 20:00-22:00 CET
Universiteitsbibliotheek
Doelenzaal
Singel425
1012 WP
Amsterdam
Recently, three collections of essays were published on “the sexual revolution’’, offering new scholarly perspectives on this turning-point in the histories of Western (and other?) societies. The Mosse Foundation invites the three editors to present their respective publications and discuss their divergent views on what changed in and since the 1960s – if anything. The status of ‘the sexual revolution’ remains controversial, with some scholars appraising it, others criticizing it and still others denying it ever took place. Has the sexual revolution received the scholarly attention it deserves?
Books Discussed:
Gert Hekma & Alain Giami (eds), Sexual Revolutions (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2014). / Alain Giami & Gert Hekma (eds), Révolutions sexuelles (Paris: Musardine, 2015).
The book discusses sexual revolutions in several European countries and the USA and engages in themes from sexual freedom, contraception and abortion to pornography and sexual variation and discusses attitudes from the perspective of youth, feminism, left, liberalism, arts, science, and religion on sexual change. The book engages the ‘sexual revolution’ as a ‘Gesamtkunstwerk’ that coincided with major social changes of those times.
Tijdschrift voor Gender Studies, “Special Issue: Sexuality in Movement: Beyond the ‘Sexual Revolution’,” 18, no. 2 (2015).
The special issue of the Dutch Journal for Gender Studies is focused on various historical and contemporary social movements not restricted to the 1960s and advocating for various sexual revolutions.
Agnes Andeweg (ed.) Seks in de nationale verbeelding (Amsterdam University Press, 2015).
The book looks into the cultural dimensions of the sexual revolution in the Netherlands. Whereas Dutch authors such as Jan Wolkers (1925-2007) and Gerard Reve (1923-2006) are generally believed to have been instrumental in breaking sexual taboos, she argues, historians have done but little serious research on the ways in which film, popular music, and literature affected attitudes toward sexuality — and the self-image of the Netherlands as a sexually liberated nation.
Speakers:
Dr. Agnes Andeweg is a lecturer at University College Utrecht. She has a background in literature and gender studies and has published widely on gothic fiction, Dutch national identity and sexual emancipation. Her essay ‘Manifestations of the Flying Dutchman: materializing the ghost and (not) remembering the colonial past’ was awarded the Essay Prize 2014 by the International Society for Cultural History.
Robert Davidson is a Ph.D. candidate at the Department of Sociology, University of Amsterdam, and he researches the development and changes in the relations between the LGBT movement and the Dutch government. He is co-editor of the Tijdschrift voor Gender Studies (Dutch Journal for Gender Studies).
Gert Hekma teaches sexuality & gender studies at the Department of Sociology, University of Amsterdam. His research is on the sociology and history of homo/sexuality. He published numerous articles, books and edited volumes on this field, e.g. Homoseksualiteit in Nederland (2004) and ABC van perversies (2009).