Latex and lingerie : Shopping for pleasure at Ann Summers 1st ed.

Author

• Storr, Merl

Additional Author(s)

-

Publisher

Oxford: Berg, 2021

Language

English

ISBN

9781847888778

Series

Materializing culture

Subject(s)

• HOME-BASED BUSINESSES
• DIRECT SELLING
• GREAT BRITAIN

Notes

. .

Abstract

This is a fascinating book, almost impossible to put down. It explores how the contemporary contradiction generated by post-feminist rhetoric is both produced and partially resolved through the marketing and practice of Ann Summers parties. These parties play with the dynamic of useless men and liberated women, offering sex toys as the solution to the power gap; they promote hegemonic masculinity as inevitable whilst ridiculing it at the same time. This book shows that sex toys are symbolically central to current power formations in gender and class relations. I can guarantee that you will learn a lot from this book. (Professor Beverley Skeggs, Department of Sociology, University of Manchester)

Meticulously researched, and written with great verve and style, Latex and Lingerie makes a major contribution to our understanding of heterosexual femininities. It shows how being ‘one of the girls’ is constructed around manifold exclusions of class, sexuality, ‘race’ and ethnicity, and how the ‘fun’ on offer in Anne Summers parties is of a distinctly post-feminist variety. Storr has fashioned a highly original analysis of female homosociality that takes both its pleasures and its problems seriously. This is an extremely important book that is destined to become a classic in the fields of gender, sexuality and cultural studies. (Rosalind Gill, Gender Institute, London School of Economics)

Physical Dimension

Number of Page(s)

1 online resource (xii, 230 p.)

Dimension

-

Other Desc.

ill.

Summary / Review / Table of Content

1. Introducing Ann Summers: The Ann Summers party plan; 'The no. 1 fun company.' --
2. 'The ultimate girls' night in': Conceptualising homosociality; Ann Summers and female homosociality. --
3. Objects of desire: Ann Summers' parties for men?; She likes men; 'All that's missing is the man!' --
4. Feminine bodies, feminine pleasures: The heterosexual female erogenous body at Ann Summers parties; The female homosocial body at Ann Summers parties --
5. Classy lingerie: Peeling the lemon; Homosocial underwear --
6. Conclusion

Exemplar(s)

#	Accession No.	Call Number	Location	Status
1.	00013/22	381.456870820941 Sto L	Online !	Available