Pornography and Difference

The graphic genital display, the come-hither look, the spike-heel shoe, and the pearl necklace, lace and leather, are all enduring features of contemporary "straight" pornography. At first blush, these objects and representations are feminine in their use and their symbolism. They appear marked as ( [...]
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The graphic genital display, the come-hither look, the spike-heel shoe, and the pearl necklace, lace and leather, are all enduring features of contemporary "straight" pornography. At first blush, these objects and representations are feminine in their use and their symbolism. They appear marked as (female) "difference." However, this book argues that the pornographic body and fetish object depend upon difference as a discursive ploy. Far from being fixed in symbolic and linguistic otherness, the female models are dressed up in a masculine vocabulary. In pornography, the boundaries between masculinity and femininity are transgressed rather than reinforced. This study of pornographic magazine photographsNsoftcore, hardcore, transsexual/transvestiteNanalyzes the visual code of these images. It engages questions about masculinity and masculine sexuality such as "Is there a necessary relation between difference and phallic desire?" "Can the masculine subject imagine otherness?" "Is there a will-to-asceticism in this (masculine) sexual surrender to indifferentiation?"