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Book Cover
E-book
Author Smith, Nicola Jo-Anne, author

Title Capitalism's sexual history / Nicola J. Smith
Published New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2020]

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Description 1 online resource (191 pages)
Series Oxford studies in gender and international relations
Oxford studies in gender and international relations.
Contents Queer Political Economy -- The Rise of a New Sexual Order -- Sex, Work, and the Victorians -- Buying Love in the Twentieth Century -- Deviant Heterosexuality in Austere Times
Summary "What is the relationship between capitalism and sexuality, and why are they so often assumed to be antithetical? The book interrogates these questions by bringing together insights from two fields that have often overlooked each other, international political economy and queer theory. It develops a queer political economy lens to understand how the history of capitalism has been intimately entangled with the history of sexuality. Yet central to this story has been the construction of sexuality as something that needs to be protected from capitalism's adulterating influence at all costs. As the author examines, this is no accident since capitalism profits greatly from the illusion that economic and sexual relations exist in distinct realms that can and must be kept apart. Focusing on the specific site of sex work in Britain, the volume draws on wide-ranging archival research to chart a genealogy of capitalist development from the Middle Ages to the present day. It shows that capitalism has long been organized around the extraction of unpaid sexual labor that, in turn, has been made possible by the creation and maintenance of a dualism between sex and work. By exposing the historical mechanisms through which the economy/sexuality dichotomy has been constituted, the book opens up new space for critical enquiry into the intersections between sex, work, and economic and sexual injustice"-- Provided by publisher
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Online resource; title from digital title page (viewed on August 20, 2020)
Subject Prostitution -- Great Britain -- History
Sex -- Economic aspects -- Great Britain -- History
Capitalism -- Social aspects -- Great Britain
Queer theory.
Feminist theory.
Electronic books.
e-books.
Capitalism -- Social aspects
Feminist theory
Prostitution
Queer theory
Sex -- Economic aspects
Great Britain
Genre/Form History
Form Electronic book
LC no. 2020012846
ISBN 9780197530290
019753029X
9780197530283
0197530281