The New Anthropology of Sexuality

In this introduction to the section onThe New Anthropology of Sexuality, the guest editors establish the precedent of sexuality as an intellectual concern of the anthropological tradition as the journal theme of the contemporary politics of sexuality. Framing their discussion from their recent book Irregular Connections in which they traced the appearances & disappearances of sexuality in the history of anthropology in Britain & North America, the editors identify the ethnographic & theoretical trends reflected in the convergence of many changes & dispositions. In particular they find connections between debates about morality, ideas of equality, hierarchy & difference, and a Foucaultian view of sexuality as an "especially dense transfer point for relations of power." A brief summary of the subsequent articles relates the theme of power to discussions of incest, trafficking of women, dissident sexuality, the same-sex marriage debate, & BDSM practice. The variety of topics covered by the articles in the journal reveals the complexity of sexuality as a topic, and reflects Foucault's suggestion that the sexual discourses which began to emerge in the 18th & 19th centuries multiple domains of deviance that were. rarely allowed to speak with their own voice are now breaking the privileged silence of the self defined center. References. J. Harwell