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The Medicalization of Sexual Deviance, Reproduction, and Functioning

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Handbook of the Sociology of Sexualities

Part of the book series: Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research ((HSSR))

Abstract

Beginning in the late nineteenth century, western science, medicine, and the emergent fields of psychiatry and sexology began to supersede custom and religion as the authorities on sex. Since this period, sexuality has been subjected to increased diagnosis, classification, surveillance, and intervention, including psychiatric, psychoanalytic, surgical, and pharmaceutical. Medicine’s influence on sexuality has been most evident in its classification, treatment, and monopolization over (1) sexualities deemed as deviant (2) sexual reproduction and (3) sexual functioning. This chapter will examine the medicalization of sex as it has unfolded in these arenas, primarily within Anglo Europe and North America where these trends have been most prevalent. It explains the medicalization thesis, traces evolving theoretical frameworks and methodologies used in scientific research and clinical practice focused on sexuality, and identifies questions for further research.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    While this criteria would make vast populations of women eligible for the nymphomania diagnostic criteria, as Groneman (1994) argues, it is difficult to know how often the diagnosis was directly applied to individual women.

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Amber Hui for her detailed and insightful RA work on this chapter.

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  1. Department of Women’s Studies, University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada

    Thea Cacchioni

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  1. Department of Sociology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin, USA

    John DeLamater

  2. Department of Sociology, Ithaca College, Ithaca, New York, USA

    Rebecca F. Plante

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Cacchioni, T. (2015). The Medicalization of Sexual Deviance, Reproduction, and Functioning. In: DeLamater, J., Plante, R. (eds) Handbook of the Sociology of Sexualities. Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-17341-2_24

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