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Identity, power, and ritual "rape play" in the S/M community

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Date Issued:
2011
Summary:
Rape play is a type of consensual, ritualistic domination and submission, developed and enacted in a sado-masochistic (S/M) sex culture, which involves the appearance of force. There are two feminist theories that can be employed in a feminist analysis of rape play: dominance/radical feminism and libertarian/"sex positive" feminism. Libertarian/"sex positive" feminism holds that S/M, including rape play, is potentially compatible with feminism because the power dynamic between a dominant/"rapist" and submissive/"victim" does not draw on either practitioners' actual social identity and the power it possesses or lacks. Dominance/radical feminism argues that gender, which is socially constructed, can best be understood as a form of sexualized domination and submission, so social identity could not be dissociated from power in S/M. My reading of guidebooks and narratives about rape play suggests that the dominance/radical feminist position is more accurate in the case of rape play, though not necessarily all of S/M culture.
Title: Identity, power, and ritual "rape play" in the S/M community.
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Name(s): Halena, Megan.
Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters
Center for Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies
Type of Resource: text
Genre: Electronic Thesis Or Dissertation
Date Issued: 2011
Publisher: Florida Atlantic University
Physical Form: electronic
Extent: v, 130 p.
Language(s): English
Summary: Rape play is a type of consensual, ritualistic domination and submission, developed and enacted in a sado-masochistic (S/M) sex culture, which involves the appearance of force. There are two feminist theories that can be employed in a feminist analysis of rape play: dominance/radical feminism and libertarian/"sex positive" feminism. Libertarian/"sex positive" feminism holds that S/M, including rape play, is potentially compatible with feminism because the power dynamic between a dominant/"rapist" and submissive/"victim" does not draw on either practitioners' actual social identity and the power it possesses or lacks. Dominance/radical feminism argues that gender, which is socially constructed, can best be understood as a form of sexualized domination and submission, so social identity could not be dissociated from power in S/M. My reading of guidebooks and narratives about rape play suggests that the dominance/radical feminist position is more accurate in the case of rape play, though not necessarily all of S/M culture.
Identifier: 754798516 (oclc), 3183128 (digitool), FADT3183128 (IID), fau:3708 (fedora)
Note(s): by Megan Halena.
Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2011.
Includes bibliography.
Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2011. Mode of access: World Wide Web.
Subject(s): Sadomasochism
Sexual dominance and submission
Sex role
Dominance (Psychology)
Identity (Psychology)
Feminist theory
Persistent Link to This Record: http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3183128
Use and Reproduction: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
Host Institution: FAU