Exploring Acts of Agency within Christian Women’s Sexuality
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/firn.v7i2.134Keywords:
agency, conservative Protestantism, femininity, sexuality, womenAbstract
Conservative Protestantism’s message for sexuality is well known – sex is only for the context of heterosexual marriage. This teaching, bolstered by conservative constructions of femininity, motivates the author to explore acts of agency within Christian women’s sexuality. The author shows women between the ages of 18 and 25 negotiating competing ecclesial and secular discourses on sexuality. Drawing from 36 qualitative interviews in which 33 identified as heterosexual and 3 as lesbian, the author discusses women separating their sexuality and Christianity because they were experienced as conflictual, one woman’s sexuality that lead her back to church, and women choosing sexual abstinence until marriage. This article demonstrates that while women continue to face the dichotomy presented between their religion and sexuality, this conception is too simplistic to explain the multiplicity and complexity of women’s faith and sexual experiences.
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References
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Siering, C. D. 2009. “Taking a Bite out of Twilight,” Ms. Magazine XIX(2) (Spring): 51–52.
Skeggs, B. 1997. Formations of Class and Gender: Becoming Respectable. London: Sage.
Surrey, J. 1991. “Relationship and Empowerment,” in J. V. Jordan, A. G. Kaplan, J. Baker Miller, I. Stiver and J. Surrey, eds. Women’s Growth in Connection: Writings from the Stone Center. London: Guilford Press, 162–80.
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Tolman, D. L. 2002. Dilemmas of Desire: Teenage Girls Talk about Sexuality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Warren, C. A. B. 2002. “Qualitative Interviewing,” in J. F. Gubrium and J. A. Holstein, eds. Handbook of Interview Research: Context & Method. London: Sage, 83–101
Aune, K. 2002. Single Women: Challenge to the Church? Carlisle: Paternoster.
Aune, K., and S. Sharma. 2007. “Sexuality and Contemporary Evangelical Christianity,” in C. Beckett, O. Heathcote and M. Macey, eds. Negotiating Boundaries? Identities, Sexualities, Diversities. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Press, 167–79.
Brereton, V. L., and M. L. Bendroth. 2001. “Secularization and Gender: An Historical Approach to Women and Religion in the Twentieth Century,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion, 13.2, 209–23. http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/157006801X00200
Clark, W. 2000. “Patterns of Religious Attendance,” Canadian Social Trends (Winter), 23–27.
Connell, R. W. 1987. Gender and Power: Society, the Person and Sexual Politics. Cambridge: Polity.
Crabtree, B. F., and W. L. Miller, eds. 1999. Doing Qualitative Research, 2nd edn. London: Sage.
Daniluk, J. C., and N. Browne. 2008. “Traditional Religious Doctrine and Women’s Sexuality: Reconciling the Contradictions,” Women & Therapy, 31.1, 129–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1300/02703140802145284
Day, A. 2008. “Wilfully Disempowered: A Gendered Response to a ‘Fallen World’,” European Journal of Women’s Studies, 15.3, 261–76. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1350506808091507
Day, E. 2008. “Is Virginity the Last Taboo,” The Observer, 13 January, 32.
Flanagan, C. 2008. “What Girls Want: A Series of Vampire Novels Illuminates the Complexities of Female Adolescent Desire,” The Atlantic (December), 108–20.
Foucault, M. 1978. The History of Sexuality Vol. 1: An Introduction. Trans. R. Hurley. New York: Pantheon.
Gilmartin, S. K. 2006. “Changes in College Women’s Attitudes toward Sexual Intimacy,” Journal of Research on Adolescence, 16.3, 429–54. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1532-7795.2006.00501.x
Grossman, L. 2008. “Stephenie Meyer: A New J. K. Rowling?” Time Magazine, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1734838-2,00.html
Harding, S. 1991. Whose Science? Whose Knowledge? Thinking from Women’s Lives. Milton Keynes: Open University Press.
Harris, A., S. Aapola and M. Gonick. 2000. “Doing it Differently: Young Women Managing Heterosexuality in Australia, Finland and Canada,” Journal of Youth Studies, 3.4, 373–88. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/713684386
Holland, J., C. Ramazanoglu, S. Sharpe and R. Thomson. 1998. The Male in the Head: Young People, Heterosexuality and Power. London: Tufnell Press.
Johnson, J. M. 2002. “In-Depth Interviewing,” in J. F. Gubrium and J. A. Holstein, eds. Handbook of Interview Research: Context & Method. London: Sage, 83–101.
Leech, K. 1997. The Sky is Red: Discerning the Signs of the Times. London: Darton, Longman & Todd.
Lyon, M. L., and J. M. Barbalet. 1994. “Society’s Body: Emotion and the ‘Somatization’ of Social Theory,” in T. J. Csordas, ed. Embodiment and Experience: The Existential Ground of Culture and Self. New York: Cambridge University Press, 48–65.
Mahoney, A. 2008. “Is It Possible for Christian Women to Be Sexual?” Women & Therapy, 31.1, 89–106. http://dx.doi.org/10.1300/02703140802145250
Mahoney, A., and O. M. Espin. 2008. “Introduction,” Women & Therapy, 31.1, 1–4. http://dx.doi.org/10.1300/02703140802145060
Martin, K. A. 1996. Puberty, Sexuality, and the Self: Girls and Boys at Adolescence. London: Routledge.
Meyer, S. 2008. Twilight. New York: Little Brown and Company.
Miller, D. E. 1997. Reinventing American Protestantism: Christianity in the New Millennium. Los Angeles: University of California Press.
Nelson, J. B. 1978. Embodiment: An Approach to Sexuality and Christian Theology. Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House.
Ozorak, E. W. 1996. “The Power, but not the Glory: How Women Empower Themselves through Religion,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 35.1, 17–29. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1386392
Quach, T. 2008. “Femininity and Sexual Agency among Young Unmarried Women in Hanoi,” Culture, Health & Sexuality 10 (June; Supplement), S151–S161.
Ramazanoglu, C., and J. Holland. 2002. Feminist Methodology: Challenges and Choices. London: Sage.
Rich, A. 1980. “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Experience,” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 5.4, 1–32.
Richardson, D. 1996. “Heterosexuality and Social Theory,” in D. Richardson, ed. Theorising Heterosexuality. Buckingham: Open University Press, 1–20.
Roper, A. 2001. “A Young Person’s Perspective on Authority and Sexuality,” in J. A. Selling, ed. Embracing Sexuality: Authority and Experience in the Catholic Church. Aldershot: Ashgate, 75–88.
Sawicki, J. 1991. Disciplining Foucault: Feminism, Power, and the Body. New York: Routledge.
Sharma, S. 2007. “The Impact of Protestant Church Involvement on Young Women’s Sexual Identities.” PhD dissertation, Lancaster: Lancaster University.
Sharma, S. 2008. “Young Women, Sexuality and Protestant Church Community: Oppression or Empowerment?” European Journal of Women’s Studies, 15.4, 345–59. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1350506808095274
Sharma, A., and K. K. Young. 2007. Women and Fundamentalism in World Religions. New York: Continuum.
Siering, C. D. 2009. “Taking a Bite out of Twilight,” Ms. Magazine XIX(2) (Spring): 51–52.
Skeggs, B. 1997. Formations of Class and Gender: Becoming Respectable. London: Sage.
Surrey, J. 1991. “Relationship and Empowerment,” in J. V. Jordan, A. G. Kaplan, J. Baker Miller, I. Stiver and J. Surrey, eds. Women’s Growth in Connection: Writings from the Stone Center. London: Guilford Press, 162–80.
Thapan, M. 1997. “Introduction: Gender and Embodiment in Everyday Life,” in M. Thapan, ed. Embodiment: Essays on Gender and Identity. Mumbai: Oxford University Press, 1–34.
Tolman, D. L. 2002. Dilemmas of Desire: Teenage Girls Talk about Sexuality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Warren, C. A. B. 2002. “Qualitative Interviewing,” in J. F. Gubrium and J. A. Holstein, eds. Handbook of Interview Research: Context & Method. London: Sage, 83–101
Published
2013-03-22
Issue
Section
Articles
How to Cite
Sharma, S. (2013). Exploring Acts of Agency within Christian Women’s Sexuality. Fieldwork in Religion, 7(2), 134–147. https://doi.org/10.1558/firn.v7i2.134
