Sexual liberation or social control?: Some aspects of the relationship between feminism and the social construction of sexual knowledge in the early twentieth century

Abstract

The social construction of sexuality as a historical process has received relatively little attention from feminists. This discussion of the role of sexology in the construction of male sexuality and heterosexual relations is intended as a contribution to understanding the maintenance and reproduction of male power. It is argued that early 20th century sexology, exemplified in the work of Havelock Ellis, undermined the feminist challenge to male supremacy in general, and male sexuality in particular; that, in the guise of scientific objectivity, it constituted a powerful ideology, legitimating male sexual domination, and conscripting women into heterosexuality by means of a doctrine of sexual pleasure. The function of both ‘science’ and liberal sexual ideology, in reinforcing the social control of women in the interests of male supremacy, raises wider questions about the relationship between sexual liberation and women's liberation.