Sexuality in Europe: A Twentieth-Century History

Dagmar Herzog

Aga 2011 · New Approaches to European History Ibhuku elingu-45 · Cambridge University Press

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This original book brings a fascinating and accessible account of the tumultuous history of sexuality in Europe from the waning of Victorianism to the collapse of Communism and the rise of European Islam. Although the twentieth century is often called 'the century of sex' and seen as an era of increasing liberalization, Dagmar Herzog instead emphasizes the complexities and contradictions in sexual desires and behaviours, the ambivalences surrounding sexual freedom, and the difficulties encountered in securing sexual rights. Incorporating the most recent scholarship on a broad range of conceptual problems and national contexts, the book investigates the shifting fortunes of marriage and prostitution, contraception and abortion, queer and straight existence. It analyzes sexual violence in war and peace, the promotion of sexual satisfaction in fascist and democratic societies, the role of eugenics and disability, the politicization and commercialization of sex, and processes of secularization and religious renewal.

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Dagmar Herzog is Professor of History and Daniel Rose Faculty Scholar at the Graduate Center, City University of New York. Her previous publications include Sex after Fascism: Memory and Morality in Twentieth-Century Germany (2005), Brutality and Desire: War and Sexuality in Europe's Twentieth Century (as editor, 2009) and Sex in Crisis: The New Sexual Revolution and the Future of American Politics (2008).