Dancing sexual pleasures: exploring teenage women’s experiences of sexuality and pleasure beyond ‘sex’

Abstract

This paper focuses on the affective and sensual dimensions of sexuality, especially on what feels good in and on the body. Drawing on a longitudinal participatory case study of a young Christian woman’s dancing practices, it illustrates how for young women sexual feelings and sexual pleasure are not only pertinent to those practices normatively constituted as ‘sex acts’ (e.g. kissing, intercourse, masturbation), but may emerge within a wide range of practices and contexts. To deepen our understanding of the situated and dynamic movement of a body’s capacities for feeling sexy or sexual, and its capacities for sensing pleasure, the paper draws on Deleuzo–Guattarian theory, especially the concepts of assemblage, territorialisation and deterritorialisation. In so doing, the paper not only makes an empirical contribution to the field of young sexualities, but also offers a contribution to the methodological literature by developing a theoretically informed approach which broadens the range of experiences which may emerge in sexuality research with young women.

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