Sexuality and American Culture

It's taken me about a week to absorb the exhibits we saw last Thursday. I guess that to sum up what I thought, I felt that the information presented was surprisingly tasteful. A little awkward at times yes, but very informative and nicely organized. I don't really know how else to describe it. I was uncomfortable and at the same time enlightened.

The first exhibit on animals and sex was probably the most familiar to me because as a biology major, I would need to learn about different animal functions at some point anyway. Much of the facts shown was not that new to me because of other classes that I took. It was the amount of information on animal sex, including the actions they perform that are very similar to human actions. One example is that of the bonobos, a species of primates that engage in acts like face to face genital sex and oral sex, something I would only expect humans to do. I was also surprised that homosexuality in animals, considered “unnatural,” was actually common for bonding purposes. This disproves the idea that animals only mate for reproduction, something that I had always believed and was never questioned in my old biology classes.

The second exhibit on sex and movies was probably the most shocking for me. Here I was, this twenty year old who has had limited, if any, exposure to anything sexual, watching these old porn clips! I did learn about how sex was portrayed over the years, both in mainstream movies and pornography films, and how the amount of sex seen in these films was controlled. There was also a sort of instructional video discussing terms related to sex that I learned more from than from my parents and friends. The only part that really bothered me was the lighting in the room, not the sex clips.

I almost did not notice the third exhibit. Like the first two exhibits, I learned more from what was shown in the collection than I would outside asking uncomfortable questions. I was especially interested in the transgendered person who had surgery to become a woman. I found that I did not really understand transgendered people beyond the stereotypes I’ve seen in movies and TV shows.  The exhibit on sex and medicine reminded me a bit of Foucault’s idea of sexual discouse in the medical field, so it was good for me to connect what I saw to what I read.