[Commlist] CfP: Psychoanalysis, Sexualities and Networked Media

*Special Issue: Psychoanalysis, Sexualities and Networked Media*

Edited by Jacob Johanssen (St. Mary’s University, 
(jacob.johanssen /at/ stmarys.ac.uk) <mailto:(jacob.johanssen /at/ stmarys.ac.uk)>*)*

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For psychoanalysis, sexuality, how it is both individually thought about 
and lived and how it is culturally constructed, is key to understanding 
both the human psyche and social change. Freud believed that the sexual 
behaviour of an individual, from the earliest stages of development 
onwards, provided key insights into how they related to others and 
themselves in life more generally. While Freud stressed that there is no 
‘normal’ sexuality and heterosexuality was a myth, his particular 
theories of female sexuality were nonetheless critiqued by feminist 
thinkers. Initially for Freud, the symptom itself was a distorted or 
covered manifestation of sexual activity which related to conflicts. 
Those ideas were developed by post-Freudian psychoanalysts in numerous 
ways. It is psychoanalysis that fundamentally contributed to the 
theorisation and understanding of the role that sexual desires and 
fantasies play in our (un)conscious forms of relating to ourselves and 
others. While psychoanalytic schools have come to understand sexuality 
in different ways, other disciplines such as queer theory, cultural 
studies and philosophy have grappled with and drawn on those 
conceptualisations of sexuality. Particular notions that are often taken 
for granted in every day discourse – perversion, fetishism, voyeurism – 
were (and are) developed by psychoanalysts. The call for papers for a 
special issue of Psychoanalysis, Culture and Society takes 
psychoanalytic theories of sexuality / sexualities and how they were 
adapted/critiqued by other disciplines as a starting point for analysing 
contemporary networked media, online spaces and digital phenomena.

In the past two decades, the Internet and networked devices have not 
only transformed societies but also human agency and subjectivity. How 
we communicate and relate to others has been shaped by our engagement 
with and immersion in digital media, devices and platforms. Social media 
in particular can be seen as enablers of unprecedented levels of human 
communication and cooperation which result in a sense of recognition and 
security for individuals, at the same time users have become data points 
which are commodified, surveyed and tracked by companies, governments 
and other entities. Contemporary online communication is also often 
marked by strong levels of hatred, aggression and polarisation which are 
characterised by the symbolic, and sometimes physical, destruction of 
the other. This proposed special issue of Psychoanalysis, Culture and 
Society places a specific focus on sexualities in contemporary online 
spaces. Sexualities have become more flexible and fluid thanks to 
technology as they are facilitated through hook up apps like Tinder, or 
Grindr. In reproductive terms, devices connected to the Internet such as 
fertility and health check apps have also become available. The Internet 
facilitates an informative and pleasurable engagement with sexualities, 
be it through online content, or communities around sexual identities 
for example. Subjects reveal aspects about their sexualities online more 
than ever before. At the same time, much of mainstream pornography has 
been critiqued as depicting women as oppressed, sexualised objects aimed 
to satisfy a male gaze. Clinicians have also noted that pornography can 
impact young people’s sexual development in harmful ways. Perhaps 
somewhat related to the widespread engagement with some forms of 
pornography, women are discussed in certain online spaces (such as 
forums on Reddit or 4chan) in highly misogynistic terms. Such language 
is often inspired by right-wing discourse and imagery which has gained 
increasing visibility online. The #MeToo movement on the other hand has 
made use of social media for activist purposes in order to resist and 
expose the widespread sexual assault and harassment conducted by men. It 
has attracted criticism for some of the methods and narratives deployed 
which have led to false accusations for example.

It is safe to say that the representation of and engagement with 
sexualities has exploded due to digital technologies. There is scope to 
interpret such aspects in depth through psychoanalysis in combination 
with other approaches.

Possible topics include but are not limited to:

- Psychoanalytic approaches to sexuality

- Psychoanalysis and other conceptualisations of sexuality (e.g. 
Foucauldian, Deleuze-Guattarian, queer theoretical)

- Clinical perspectives on sexuality and digital media

- Repression and its status today

- Pleasures, unpleasures – Eros and the death drive

- #MeToo and activism against sexualised violence

- The Alt-Right and online misogyny

- Online pornography

- Livestreaming and camming

- Hook-up apps

- The Internet of Things (fertility devices, sex toys, sex robots, etc.)

- Social media

- Games and gaming cultures

- Virtual reality and forms of simulation

Please send abstracts of no longer than 500 words to Jacob Johanssen 
((jacob.johanssen /at/ stmarys.ac.uk) <mailto:(jacob.johanssen /at/ stmarys.ac.uk)>) 
by *09 September 2019*. Accepted full papers will be due in February 
2020. The special issue will be published in December 2020.

Article length: 6-8,000 words

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*About the journal*

/Psychoanalysis, Culture and Society/is an international, peer-reviewed 
journal published by Palgrave 
(https://www.palgrave.com/gb/journal/41282). It explores the 
intersection between psychoanalysis and the social world. It is a 
journal of both clinical and academic relevance which publishes articles 
examining the roles that psychoanalysis can play in promoting and 
achieving progressive social change and social justice.

Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society benefits a worldwide community of 
psychoanalytically informed scholars in the social and political 
sciences, media, cultural and literary studies, as well as clinicians 
and practitioners who probe the relationship between the social and the 
psychic. It is the official journal of the Association for the 
Psychoanalysis of Culture & Society.

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