Curating desire: confessing to the algorithm
OA Version
Citation
Abstract
This thesis argues for re-examining the domination of sex-workers in the age of user-generated pornography through disciplinary power and calls for a transformative and reparative approach to experiencing sexuality and sexual desire in this capitalist society. I put forth this argument by reading Michel Foucault’s Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison and History of Sex and Sexuality, Volume I, in conjunction with feminist theorists such as Andrea Dworkin, Catherine MacKinnon, and Gayle Rubin, where they discuss the domination of women in pornography in the 1980s and 1990s. I read and analyze these texts with an inspection of OnlyFans’ and PornHub’s website characteristics. I posit that these websites employ disciplinary power to craft a “docile body” for patriarchal capitalism. By analyzing the change in the nature of pornography, I will provide evidence that sex-workers are not free from domination but are being subjected to a new, even more pervasive power. I build on this analysis to argue for an alternative reparative politics of sexuality and sexual desire that could begin to escape this domination and provide a horizon to a future world that is not yet.
Description
2024
License
Attribution 4.0 International