What (else) can a sexy body do?

1. What (else) can a sexy body do? Nick Fox Professor of Sociology University of Sheffield

2. To understand sexualisation, let us see how it works, what can it do ?

3. Introduction • A Deleuzian approach to sexuality • What is an assemblage? • Desire • Ecology of sexuality- assemblages Body assemblage

4. A Deleuzian Perspective • Different ontology: connectivities and networks rather than bodies. • Positive desire. • Territorialisation. • What else can a body do?

5. Life is lived through assemblages

6. Image: ‘The bride stripped bare by her bachelors, even’. Marcel Duchamp ,1923. Assemblages • Assemblages are ‘a kind of chaotic network of habitual and non-habitual connections, always in flux, always reassembling in different ways’ (Potts 2004: 19). • Desiring-machines

7. Assemblages of Relations • Physical (e.g. hormones, medicines). • Psychological (e.g. Oedipal, fetishes). • Social-cultural (e.g. institutions, imagery, norms and values). • Philosophical and abstract (e.g. chastity, religion, sexual liberation). • (Experiential/individual)

8. Examples of Assemblages mouth – hunger - milk – nipple – mother patient – disease – doctor – biomedicine – health technology sex organ – hormones – other body

9. Desire • Deleuze and Guattari criticise traditional ideas of desire as a lack. • Positive desire: the creative, experimenting, driven body. • Capitalism exploits the gap between desire and lack.

10. Territorialisation • Assemblages territorialise the BwO. • It can be de-territorialised by novel relations. • It can be re-territorialised. • It can achieve a line of flight from a territory.

11. What can a body do? • Assemblages of relations create the conditions of possibility for desire. • The number and intensity of a body’s relations shape what it can do. • This question provides a methodology . Mark Rothko at work

12. An Ecology of Assemblage • Assemblages bring together entities that are organic and non-organic; material and abstract , technological and natural. • The unit of analysis should be the ecology of relations, not individuals or bodies. • Explore the connectivities within this ecology of assemblage.

13. The Rabbit Assemblage

14. Rabbit-Assemblage • Don’t think of an entity called ‘rabbit’ , but of an ecology of rabbit-ing. food – field – rabbit – other rabbits – warren - predators – my roses – angry human – shotgun • I am part of the rabbit-assemblage and it is part of the Fox-assemblage.

15. ‘ ‘Once the machines are assembled, they have an identity and a life of their own’ (Ballantyne 2007: 23)

16. Sexuality as assemblage • The sexuality-assemblage comprises disparate relations. • It shapes what the sexy body can do. • It shapes our desire.

17. Exploring Sexuality • ‘Given a certain effect, what machine [assemblage] is capable of producing it?’ • ‘And given a certain machine, what can it be used for?’ (Deleuze and Guattari 1984: 3)

18. What can a sexy body do? • Be aroused • Get sexual pleasure/orgasm • Get sexual partners • Fall in love • Be unfaithful • Etc. etc. Waterhouse: Hylas and the Nymphs 1896

19. Sexuality-assemblages A pubescent assemblage : hormones – sex organs - imagery (e.g. kiss) – role models – sexual others + ??? An adolescent assemblage: hormones – sex organs - sexual imagery – ideal types (Jlo, Pitt) – partial objects (e.g. breasts, pecs, ass) - sexual others– peer group – romance – isolation - ???

20. Sexuality assemblages A generalised assemblage: hormones – sex organs - (sexual) past history – sexual imagery/marketing/porn –partial objects - fetishes (e.g. clothing) - sexual others – romance – love – marriage - ???

21. Sexualisation • In any era, the sexuality-assemblage incorporates social, economic, ideological and political relations (e.g. capitalism, patriarchy, sexism). • Sexualisation is a narrowing of sexuality, within a body – commodity assemblage.

22. Sex as commodity • Capitalism exploits the gap between desire and lack (Deleuze and Guattari 1984). • While there is scarcity, there is this gap. • The sexuality-assemblage is drawn into a larger economic machine (assemblage) that turns bodies into commodities and desire into money.

23. Territorialising sexuality The commodified sexual body is territorialised: - Youthfulness - Looks and beauty - Body shape - Sexual behaviour and responses - Types of sexual activity and fantasies.

24. The Viagra assemblage ‘My best friend at the office introduced me to Viagra a week after he saw my attitude change at the office due to my noticeable depression. Thanks to Viagra, I felt I am gaining my manhood again, but now lazy of doing sex without the blue pill. I am now becoming a big fan of Viagra, and afraid of having sex without Viagra’ (George).

25. The Viagra assemblage sex – bedroom –penis – male sexuality – Viagra – identity - consumerism – sex partner - internet - pharmaceutical industry – profit – capitalism (Fox and Ward 2008) This may be very constraining and not welcomed by partners (Potts et al 2003).

26. The Viagra-assemblage • Links the private world of the sexual conduct to the interests of global capitalism. • Contributes to sexual and health identities. • Shapes the experience and expectations of sexuality.

27. Too much sex ... or not enough? • Commodification narrows the expression of sexuality. • Desire is territorialised within a fantasy-assemblage. • The positive desire of the body engages with the materiality of bodies and sexuality.

28. Some conclusions • Sexuality is an assemblage that shapes how the body’s desire is directed • Look at the ecology of the network. • Assemblages link flesh to the economic and political forces of global capitalism. • De-territorialise a myriad of individual possible sexualities.

29. In the Fox-assemblage • Deleuze and Guattari • Ansell Pearson • Latour • Buchanan • De Landa • Potts

30. What (else) can a sexy body do? Nick Fox Professor of Sociology University of Sheffield