Good Vibrations: Charting the Dominant and Emergent Discursive Regimes of Sex Toys

The Qualitative Report 21(8), pp.1475-1494 (2016)

22 Pages Posted: 24 Mar 2016 Last revised: 18 Aug 2016

Date Written: February 16, 2016

Abstract

Sex toys promote a new consumptive ethos whose significance may be adequately outlined by attending to the institutional implications of this product category’s consumption. By drawing on Foucault’s theory of sexuality and the technologies of the self that materialize with the aid of discursive formations about sexuality, as well as on relevant sociological and ethnographic insights, I undertake a qualitative content analysis on a corpus of 100 sex toys’ product reviews from popular magazines and web sites in order to identify how the discourse about sex toys is articulated in terms of three dominant categories of sexual scripts (Simon & Gagnon, 2007), viz. cultural scenarios, interpersonal scripts and intrapsychic scripts. By opening up the discussion to broader cultural issues, I outline how the consumption experience of sex toys, as articulated in the reviews’ discursive formations, facilitates the emergence of new consumer trends, particularly with reference to orgasm-on-the-go and no-touch-orgasm, while redefining existing ones.

Keywords: Foucault, sexuality,qualitative content analysis, discourse analysis, sex toys, disciplinary regime

Suggested Citation

Rossolatos, George, Good Vibrations: Charting the Dominant and Emergent Discursive Regimes of Sex Toys (February 16, 2016). The Qualitative Report 21(8), pp.1475-1494 (2016), Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2736729 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2736729

George Rossolatos (Contact Author)

University of Kassel ( email )

Fachbereich 05
Nora-Platiel-Straße 1
34109 Kassel, Hessen 34127
Germany

HOME PAGE: http://grossolatos.blogspot.com/

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