The Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC)

The Prize and the Price
Shaping sexualities in South Africa

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What is the Prize, and who pays the Price? The desired and the desirable are often constellated through our ideas of what is undesired and undesirable, deeply knotted into our sense of self, our sense of where and how we fit into the world. These notions of desire form the backdrop to this powerful volume which examines the historical continuities and interruptions of heteronormativity in South African society.

Leading and emerging scholars disentangle the strands of particular sexual identities, and deepen the reader's understanding of the multiple workings of heteronormativity in South African society in particular, and sexuality in general. Through analyzing where and how heteronormativity intersects with other axes of power and social identity, contributors to this volume reveal that it is not monolithic, and heterosexuality as the South African norm is effectively 'outed' from within heteronormativity.

The chapters extend beyond the well researched areas of sexuality - same sexualities, HIV/AIDS and gender-based violence - to less discussed areas, such as childhood sexuality and disability. The multiplicity of issues raised have relevance for a range of readers interested in the fledgling field of Sexualities Studies, and in its significance the scholarship extends well beyond the borders of South Africa.

Open Access

Product information

Format : 240mm x 168mm (Soft Cover)
Pages : 424
ISBN 10 : 0-7969-2239-X
ISBN 13 : 978-07969-2239-7
Publish Year : 2009
Rights : World Rights

Acknowledgements
Dedication

1. The prize and the price
Melissa Steyn and Mikki van Zyl

NEGOTIATING NEW DEALS

2. Colouring sexualities: how some black South African schoolgirls respond to racial and gendered inequalities
Rob Pattman and Deevia Bhana

3. Glamour, glitz and girls: the meanings of femininity in high school Matric Ball culture in urban South Africa
Elaine Salo and Bianca Davids

4. E-race-ing the line: South African interracial relationships yesterday and today
Rebecca Sherman and Melissa Steyn

FLIPPING THE COIN

5. Renegotiating masculinity in the Lowveld: narratives of male-male sex in compounds, prisons and at home
Isak Niehaus

6. Fauna, flora and fucking: female sex safaris in South Africa
Haley A McEwen

7. Are blind people better lovers?
Reinette Popplestone

8. Sexuality in later life
Helena B Thornton, F C V Potocnik and J E Muller

PAYING THE PRICE

9. The weather watchers: Gender, violence and social control in South Africa
Lillian Artz

10. Nurturing the sexuality of disabled girls: The challenges of parenting for mothers
Washeila Sait, Theresa Lorenzo, Melissa Steyn and Mikki van Zyl

11. A decent place? Space and morality in a former 'poor white' suburb
Annika Teppo

12. Less is (M)orr: Aprs le dluge (Or rather: More or less ...): An essay about and conversation with Margaret Orr
Joan Hambidge and Margaret Orr

HOLDING ONTO THE PRIZE

13. Heterosex among young South Africans: Research reflections
Tamara Shefer and Don Foster

14. Apartheid, anti-apartheid and post-apartheid sexualities
Kopano Ratele

15. 'Astride a dangerous dividing line': A discourse analysis of preschool teachers' talk about childhood sexuality
Jane van der Riet

QUE(E)RYING THE CONTRACT

16. Criminalising the act of sex: Attitudes to adult commercial sex work in South Africa
Jillian Gardner

17. Queer marriage: Sexualising citizenship and the development of freedoms in South Africa
Vasu Reddy

18. Beyond the Constitution: from sexual rights to belonging
Mikki van Zyl

CONCLUSION

19. Shaping sexualities
Melissa Steyn and Mikki van Zyl

Contributors
Index

Melissa Steyn is Associate Professor in Sociology and Director of Intercultural and Diversity Studies of Southern Africa at the University of Cape Town. Although she publishes on many aspects of diversity, she is best known as the author of Whiteness Just isn't What it Used to Be: White identity in a changing South Africa (2001), which was awarded an Outstanding Scholarship award from the National Communication Association, USA, and as co-editor of the series Shaping Sexualities.

Mikki van Zyl, a lifelong anti-apartheid and gender activist, is presently completing a doctorate on same-sex marriage in South Africa, has an MPhil in Feminist Sexual Politics, and has lectured in Media Studies, Sociology, Criminology, Disability Studies and Diversity Studies. For 20 years she has worked as a researcher, trainer and writer in gender, sexualities and development and participatory action research. She co-edited Performing Queer with Steyn.

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