Discourses of desire : the normative in online sex talk
This thesis, grounded in feminist sociology and queer theory, examines sex, sexuality, and desire in naturally occurring synchronous conversations within a non-sexually themed online community. Although the community is rooted in computing culture (i.e., a multi-user domain) and is not sexual in scope or purpose, sex talk is prevalent and persistent in the corpus. Seventy-five conversational logs, each covering 24 hours of conversations, are analysed using qualitative sociolinguistic discourse analysis. The findings demonstrate that the participants engage in sexual conversations (e.g., automated sexual commands, joking, self-disclosure, cybersex) that make use of the spatial and technical resources available to them, and that there are clear boundaries in the language used for sexual conversations. Sexual conversations are found across virtual spaces in this community and are based on in-group talk, often to create social belonging and shared meaning between speakers. While participants sometimes challenge existing social discourses of sexuality when adopting group-specific norms and narrative styles, they often enact them, particularly in regards to heteronormative heterosexuality and gender. This thesis
Myketiak, Chrystie Layne
Computer Science ; Linguistics
Discourses of desire : the normative in online sex talk. This thesis, grounded in feminist sociology and queer theory, examines sex, sexuality, and desire in naturally occurring synchronous conversations within a non-sexually themed online community. Although the community is rooted in computing culture (i.e., a multi-user domain) and is not sexual in scope or purpose, sex talk is prevalent and persistent in the corpus. Seventy-five conversational logs, each covering 24 hours of conversations, are analysed using qualitative sociolinguistic discourse analysis. The findings demonstrate that the participants engage in sexual conversations (e.g., automated sexual commands, joking, self-disclosure, cybersex) that make use of the spatial and technical resources available to them, and that there are clear boundaries in the language used for sexual conversations. Sexual conversations are found across virtual spaces in this community and are based on in-group talk, often to create social belonging and shared meaning between speakers. While participants sometimes challenge existing social discourses of sexuality when adopting group-specific norms and narrative styles, they often enact them, particularly in regards to heteronormative heterosexuality and gender. This thesis
discourses desire normative online sex talk ground feminist sociology theory examines sex sexuality desire naturally_occur synchronous conversation within non sexually online community although community root culture multi user domain sexual scope purpose sex talk prevalent persistent corpus seventy conversational log cover hours conversation analyse_use qualitative sociolinguistic discourse_analysis finding participant engage sexual conversation automate sexual command self disclosure make_use spatial technical resource_available clear boundary language_use sexual conversation sexual conversation find across virtual space community base group talk often create social belonging share meaning speaker participant sometimes challenge_exist social discourse sexuality adopt group specific norm narrative style often enact particularly_regard gender