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Sexualities

Girls Want Sex, Boys Want Love: Resisting Dominant Discourses of (Hetero) Sexuality
Louisa Allen Sexualities 2003 6: 215 DOI: 10.1177/1363460703006002004 The online version of this article can be found at: http://sex.sagepub.com/content/6/2/215

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Article

Abstract Based on empirical research with 1719 year olds, this article explores young peoples understandings of themselves as sexual in relation to dominant discourses of (hetero)sexuality. It is concerned with providing empirical evidence of resistance in young peoples constitution of their sexual subjectivities. The research ndings suggest that young people generally draw upon dominant discourses of (hetero)sexuality in their talk about themselves as sexual. However some took up subject positions that involved more resistant conceptions of the sexual self. For some young people this took the form of simultaneously accommodating and resisting subject positions offered by traditional discourses of (hetero)sexuality. It is argued that the potential to take up more resistant subject positions was partly contingent upon young peoples location in contexts that offered access to, or opened space for, other ways of constituting themselves as sexual. Keywords dominant discourses, heterosexuality, resistance, young mens sexuality, young womens sexuality

Louisa Allen
University of Auckland

Girls Want Sex, Boys Want Love: Resisting Dominant Discourses of (Hetero)sexuality
Understanding the (hetero)sexual1 subjectivities of young people has become a focus of research in an era when HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted infections are a global problem.2 Such insights are invaluable for informing the design of sexuality education3 programmes and their strategies.4 If these programmes are to be relevant and engaging, they must acknowledge how young people construct meaning about their sexual selves. This article argues that such constructions are more complex and diverse than conventional perceptions about young women wanting love from relationships and young men desiring sex. With reference to empirical research, I propose that some young people speak about their Sexualities Copyright 2003 SAGE Publications (London, Thousand Oaks, CA and New Delhi)
Vol 6(2): 215236[1363-4607(200305)6:2; 215236; 032431]

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sexuality in ways that both conform and deviate to varying degrees from traditional constructions of female and male (hetero)sexualities. Such ndings challenge sexuality education to reframe its messages in acknowledgement of the complex ways young people speak about themselves as sexual subjects. This article explores the discursive production of subjectivities in young peoples talk about their sexual selves. It understands that discourses make available particular subject positions (certain ways-of-seeing the world and certain ways-of-being in the world) that when taken up, have particular implications for subjectivity and experience (Willig, 2001: 107). This process of taking up positions is not simply a cognitive choice, but rather a complex process of becoming that involves being subject/ed to, and subject of discourse (Jones, 1997: 261). Butler puts it this way: There is no self . . . who maintains integrity prior to its entrance into this conicted cultural eld. There is only the taking up of tools where they lie, where the very taking up is enabled by the tool lying there (1990: 145). For some theorists however, the mere availability of subject positions in discourse can not account for the emotional investments individuals make in particular discursive positions (Willig, 2001: 118). Some of these theorists employ psychoanalytic concepts to explain why subjects take up some tools and not others (see Hollway, 1989). Others have pointed to the way in which discourses are strongly implicated in the exercise of power (Willig, 2001: 107). Dominant discourses derive considerable power from their entrenchment within discursive elds such as the legal system, religion and the family. As they legitimate existing power relations and structures by dening what is normal, alternative or oppositional subject positions are not usually perceived as desirable or even possible alternatives (Davies, 1989). However the power of dominant discourses is not monolithic. Foucault maintains this is because where there is power, there is resistance (Foucault, 1978); he explains by stating:
. . . as soon as theres a relation of power theres a possibility of resistance. Were never trapped by power: its always possible to modify its hold, in determined conditions following a precise strategy. (Foucault, 1980: 13)

This article explores Foucaults notion of the possibility of resistance in relation to the discursive construction of young peoples sexual subjectivities. I am interested in determining whether young peoples talk about their sexual selves resists dominant meanings about (hetero)sexuality. In this way I attempt to grapple with questions within post-structural theory around the agency of the subject and the power of discourse. The ndings reveal that some narratives offered by young people appear to resist dominant discourses about (hetero)sexuality, implying a 216

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subject/ive agency. This agency is conceptualized not as the result of a pre-discursive humanist subject who is able to choose their sexual subjectivity, but rather as lying within the constitutive force of discourse (Davies, 1997). As the constitutive force of discourses are never completely realized (Sawicki, 1991) their power cannot be total (this would imply force not power and subsequently the total determination of the subject). Instead, the constitutive force of discourse produces an (inherent) agency for the subject rendering the potential for resistance ever present. As Hekman explains, agency can be seen as a capacity that ows from discursive formations (Hekman, 1995: 203). For young people in this research the realization of this capacity appeared to be regulated by particular circumstances. These were associated with young peoples social location and subsequent exposure to other ways of constituting sexual subjectivity (e.g. attending a school where critical pedagogies are practised). They were also contingent upon the immediate circumstances in which young people were situated in the research (for example, a focus group where the risk to sexual reputation of talking about an active and desiring female sexuality was equal for all participants). The narratives presented in this article belong to New Zealanders aged 1719 years, three-quarters of whom were at school at the time of the research, while the remainder were enrolled in employment training programmes in the community.5 Narratives were collected using focus groups,6 individual and couple interviews7 and a questionnaire, a combination designed to elicit different stories dependent upon the context in which they were produced. While there was considerable ethnic and socio-economic diversity amongst the 515 subjects,8 the research was informed by feminist methodology and took gender as its primary analytic category. In my selection and organization of these young peoples narratives I hope to show that while many drew on dominant discourses of (hetero)sexuality to constitute their sexual selves, some also spoke in ways that resisted these meanings. For some young people this meant being multiply positioned in a way that enabled them to simultaneously accommodate and resist taken-for-granted meanings about female and male sexuality.

Traditional (hetero)sexualities
Jackson argues we all learn to be sexual within a society in which real sex is dened as a quintessentially heterosexual act, vaginal intercourse, and in which sexual activity is thought of in terms of an active subject and passive object (Jackson, 1996: 23). The dominance of (hetero)sexual identity and discursive practices that support an active male and passive female sexuality are deeply embedded within social and political 217

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participation and perceived as normative. These discourses have been historically shaped by elds such as religion, medicine, law, media and academic disciplines (Hawkes, 1996). One such discursive eld in which the construction of female sexuality has been traced historically in New Zealand9 is the literature disseminated about sexuality. This construction of female sexuality has been one of passivity and vulnerability where women were perceived as having less desire and achieving sexual pleasure less easily than men (Allen, 1996). Other studies (Phillips, 1996) have sketched the construction of Pakeha10 masculinity since colonization and reveal the way in which male sexuality has been conceptualized as (hetero)sexual, active, easily gratied and unbridled. While these discourses might appear old-fashioned in light of New Zealands contemporary social and political climate, some researchers maintain New Zealand sexual mores are relatively conservative (Davis et al., 1996: 49). Verication of this can be found in the sex advice offered by Dr Rosie King in New Zealands Womans Day on Good loving, Great Sex (August, 1999). In this highly popular womens magazine, Dr King explains womens turn-ons as romantic gestures, communication, nondemand affection and quality time with partner, while what excites men is erotica, pornography, varied love making, lingerie and female nudity. Here the construction of women and mens sexuality is dichotomized, with women lacking erotic desire, voyeuristic tendencies and corporeal pleasure, while men are disconnected from their emotional and mental needs and desires.

Young women and dominant discourses of female (hetero)sexuality

As dominant discourses that are historically entrenched within New Zealand society, the construction of male and female (hetero)sexuality described earlier regularly featured in young peoples talk about their sexual selves. In drawing on these discourses young women were positioned as sexually vulnerable and less easily pleasured11 than young men, victim to male sexual gratication and more interested in the emotional aspects of physical intimacy. They subsequently appeared as the subordinate partner in (hetero)sexual relationships who was acted upon, rather than acting. These conventional conceptualizations of female sexuality are evident in the following narratives from focus groups and individual interviews. In the rst example one young woman in a mixedgender group draws on conventional meanings of female sexuality by stressing the importance of emotional intimacy and her apathy with regard to sexual activity: 218

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Caitlin:

. . . but to me its really the emotional side which is important and thats why I like to cuddle and that rather than have sex . . . like sometimes I just cant be bothered and just want to get it over and done with . . . I guess that sounds quite odd but like we have been together for 3 years now. (FG, AS, 18)12

In another mixed-gender focus group where participants were learning business skills, one young woman spoke about female sexuality in terms of traditional notions of vulnerability where womens romantic ideas of love made them susceptible to exploitation by their male partner:
Alex: I think like the girls get more vulnerable like being . . .

Leanne: They fall into it more . . . Alex: Yeah being in love with the fact of being in love sort of thing and theyll do anything for their man, and the man sort of goes oh yeah, take advantage of this. (FG, NAS, 17)

During an individual interview Cam explained how she saw women as less easily sexually aroused and more likely to be stimulated by foreplay, than sexual intercourse:
Louisa: Cam: Is there anything about the sexual part of the relationship that you would change if you could? Its like uhm, just like, guys dont really need as much foreplay as women do to feel satised and like sometimes Chriss really good with stuff like that but other times hes not and . . . (II, NAS, 19)

When talking about their decision to have sexual intercourse with their partner for the rst time, four of the six young women who participated in the couple interviews constructed notions of traditional female sexual passivity. This was seen through their expression of anxiety about having sex and the fact that it was their partners who broached this subject rst. Such talk suggested that they did not perceive themselves to necessarily be in control of events. Amy and Emma indicated their anxiety about engaging in sexual intercourse in terms of worries about pregnancy, what others might think, and feelings of insecurity within the relationship. These anxieties implied a reluctance to engage in such activity, even though both young women eventually did:
Louisa: Amy: So how did you feel about having sex? (a) I was worried about my parents nding out. (b) I was worried that it was going to hurt and (c) I was worried about pregnancy and it was really worrying me and it was like well you know I dont know if I really want to do this. (CA, AS, 17)

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Emma:

Im a bit more wary about, okay very wary about being used and I was still worried okay is he using me then leaving me? Cause I am very dependent on feeling loved and if I was going to enter into that sort of level of relationship [sexual intercourse] . . . I was thinking right I dont want to be used again, I want to really know that he loves me. (II, AS, 17)

In the couple interview, two couples revealed how the suggestion to have sexual intercourse was initiated by the male partner, who attempted to convince the young woman to engage in it. One couple indicated this in the following discussion:
Chris: I wanted to have sex with her and Cam said no and then we talked for another two hours maybe (laugh) and uhm uhm and then Cam said yes. (To Cam) The rst time when you said no what were you thinking? It was just like uhm, about a month and a half before I had just got out of a relationship which uhm like a short relationship and I didnt want the same thing to happen again. So I kind of wanted to make sure about what was going to happen and stuff like that. (CA, NAS, 19)

Louisa: Cam:

The talk of these young women draws on conventional discourses of (hetero)sexuality in which women are positioned as the (reluctant) recipients of male desires rather than the initiators of sexual activity. In taking up13 subject positions offered by these discourses these young women are constituted as the objects of sexual attention who must be reassured/convinced that intercourse will not have negative repercussions for them. In the rst extracts, Cam, Leanne, Alex and Caitlin are positioned as possessing bodies that are less interested in/or easily satised by physical contact than young mens and are instead rendered more concerned with the emotional aspect of relationships. This talk reproduced notions of young women generally wanting love, not sex from their partner(s). Despite the prevalence of these constructions of female sexuality this was not the only way in which young women constituted their sexual selves in their narratives. At any historical moment discursive formations are multiple and heterogenous, so that even though in every era there will be hegemonic discourses, other non-hegemonic discourses will also exist, forming a discursive mix from which subjectivity can be constructed (Hekman, 1995: 203). Contemporary meanings, about for example girl power, offer young women the possibility of being positioned as active and desiring sexual agents. As Jones explains:
. . . the point is that the social order within which femininity is discursively constructed . . . is not seamlessly consistent . . . it is in the gaps opened by this

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unevenness that the possibilities for resistance . . . can be developed. (Jones, 1993: 161)

This heterogeneity in discursive formation meant that the sexual subjectivities of young women in this study were not always constituted through dominant meanings about female sexuality.

Young women resisting dominant discourses of (hetero)sexuality

A signicant minority of young women drew on discourses that resisted dominant meanings about female sexuality most of the time, or some of the time in their talk. Rosalind was one of these young women who had been exposed to other ways of conceptualizing female sexuality through attending a school renowned for its alternative pedagogies. Her access to a set of meanings, which she named as stereotypes, enabled her to resist the positioning of young women as always wanting commitment and love from relationships. Talking about how sexuality is gendered, Rosalind said, I mean you have got your stereotypical, women want commitment and love and guys just want a ing, but I think that girls are pretty much like that as well [laugh] (FG, AS, 17). Some young women resisted other subject positions offered by the operation of the sexual double standard. Lees (1993) describes this as the social processes by which young women who have many sexual partners are labelled slags or sluts, while young men displaying equivalent behaviour gain the status of studs. Two young women in the focus groups, Shona and Anna, spoke about the sexual double standard in a way that simultaneously resisted and accommodated the slut label.
Lindel: Shona: My friends every weekend theyre with someone different . . . Im one of them . . . nah Im not at the moment though [Shona was about to have a baby in 3 weeks time] (FG, NAS, 17)

Shonas talk illustrates an accommodation of this meaning of female sexuality in the way she adopts the term slut to describe herself. Her comment Im not at the moment though indicates this is not an understanding she has of herself while pregnant. The inclusion of, at the moment suggests she might choose to return to being a slut sometime in the future. Her words defy the negative social constitution of her as a pregnant 17-year-old, by rendering her more legitimately as a mother to be. At the same time however her sexual agency is maintained by suggesting that being sexual (i.e. sexually active) is something she can return to later. Such talk implies a complex accommodation and resistance of the subject position slut. 221

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Similarly, Anna draws on a discourse of female sexuality that legitimates young womens desire and enables her to resist being positioned as a slut, by constituting her sexual desire as normal.
Anna: I was called a slut when I cheated on someone and I was called a slut . . . but a slut is supposed to be someone who sleeps around, I dont sleep around. (FG, NAS, 17)

By constituting her sexual self through discursive resources that recognize and legitimate womens sexual desire as normal, Annas behaviour is not dened as that of a slut. Instead her desire for one other person outside of her relationship is constructed as ordinary and acceptable. She resists the positioning of slut by constituting herself through this talk as a woman who has a right to possess and act on her sexual desires. A special set of circumstances formed the discursive context within which these resistant constructions of female sexual subjectivity were deployed. Both Shona and Anna were pregnant and living in accommodation for young women adjusting to unplanned pregnancies at the time of the research. In this environment they were given excellent support, counselling and advice about their pregnancy and future life with their babies. As part of this programme they recounted their participation in a workshop where the facilitator had asked them to reect upon and discuss gendered sexual stereotypes. It is likely their resistance to dominant sets of meanings around female sexuality was made possible by their social location within this environment. This context enabled access to other conceptualizations of female sexuality. Dominant discourses of female (hetero)sexuality offer subject positions where women are conceptualized as less desiring and less easily pleasured than men. However, some young women articulated their desire and experiences of sexual pleasure during the research. Their words contested the image of young women as sexually passive, uninterested in sexual contact and unable to enjoy corporeal pleasures. Instead, they described passion and pleasure as normal expressions and experiences of their sexuality. This is revealed in the following discussions within focus groups and couple interviews. One of the couples Nina and Neil, explained how traditional gender norms that construct males as active and females as passive, were reversed in their relationship:
Neil: Nina: Cause like most of the time I can go without it, whereas Nina cant [Neil laughs]. Yeah its kinda like, we always hassle that its kind of like, do you watch Married with Children? And Im Peggy Bundy and hes like Al [laugh] I think thats actually quite a good way to describe it [laugh].14 (CA, NAS, mixed)

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Unconventional expressions of female sexual pleasure and desire also emerged in focus groups such as this all female group who were at school:
Louisa: Hine: Louisa: Hine: . . . Yeah because as you say there is that kind of stereotype where its the guy who always wants the physical activity. Yeah but its sometimes opposite. Heaps sometimes [all laugh]. In your experience? Yeah. (FG, AS, 17)

One young woman who was at school and took part in a mixed focus group talked about the importance of the physical side of her relationships in an unconventionally feminine way:
Caitlin: I reckon that like the physical part of the relationship is really important to me like I wouldnt be able to, you know even if I loved someone I wouldnt be able to stay with them for the rest of my life if the physical side wasnt good you know. (FG, AS, 18)

In another single-sex focus group at school, Lesley openly expressed her feelings of desire and the need to act on them:
Lesley: . . . this is just from my experience but, if I feel lust for someone then I . . . I have to do something about it. (FG, AS, 17)

Similarly during a mixed focus group, Rosalind constituted an active female sexuality by explaining how she had decided to ask someone out:
Rosalind: I was a bit nervous about asking someone out . . . but the last time I approached someone it was okay . . . It was okay I obviously dont have a problem with it. (FG, AS, 17)

Because of the sexual double standard and young womens need to safeguard their sexual reputations, talk about female desire and pleasure occurred mainly in environments where young women felt they would not be negatively stigmatized. Exclusively female groups where the risk of reputation was equal for all participants, or mixed gender groups where trust between peer members was established, provided examples of safe spaces. Young womens access to alternative ways of constituting female sexuality was also apparent from the quantitative data. As Table 1 indicates, when young people were asked in the questionnaire what they felt they had the most control over in their sexual relationships, young women reported feeling they had more control than young men over all of the elements of sexual activity named. Of the young women, 78 per cent felt that they had control over contraception, indicating a particular sense of agency around this aspect of sexual activity. These statistics imply the presence of more active, rather than passive, female sexual subjectivities amongst the women in the questionnaire sample. 223

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Table 1. What do young people feel they have the most control over? (By gender)

Type of Activity

% Young Women % Young Men ()=N ()=N Control Some None Control Some None (117) 58.4 (156) 78.0 (132) 66.0 (77) 38.3 (34) 17.0 (58) 29.0 (6) 3.3 (10) 5.0 (10) 5.0 (52) 44.3 (71) 60.3 (39) 33.3 (57) 48.4 (39) 33.6 (64) 54.7 (8) 7.4 (7) 6.0 (14) 12.0

Kinds of sexual activity Contraception How often to have sex

* N = 317, Female = 200, Male = 117.

The statistics in Table 1 raise important questions about the relationship between how young peoples talk constitutes them as sexual subjects and their actual sexual behaviour. Discursive constructions can be seen to have real effects in the way that language constitutes meaning and possibilities for practice. However as Willig points out; If discourse does, indeed, construct reality, then to what extent can reality be said to constrain discourse? (Willig, 2001: 119). To illustrate, it might be argued that there is a juncture between the feeling of control over contraception in a relationship and actually having access to material power in this situation. This point is clearly supported in Holland et al.s research which reported some young women as empowered at an intellectual level but unable to achieve this agency (always or at all) within their relationship practice (Holland et al., 1998). Similarly, there is an abundance of research15 indicating that sexual coercion and rape are experienced by high proportions of women. Such ndings suggest that constructions of active female sexuality may not always nd expression within the material constraints of relationship practice.

Young men and dominant discourses of male (hetero)sexuality

Young men also drew on dominant discourses of (hetero)sexuality in the constitution of their sexual subjectivities. Taking up subject positions offered by these discourses meant being seen as sexually assertive, emotionally detached, with a voracious sexual desire and a body that guaranteed them satisfaction. One of the many instances in which young men portrayed this image of 224

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sexual self was when I asked Ashby, how he knew he wanted to have sex with his girlfriend and he explained Uhm I was horny [laugh]. That was about it [laugh] and later during the individual interview he added . . . cause see like I didnt care, I could have done it at the start of the relationship, I didnt need time. Im a guy (AS, II, 17). Most of the examples of young men taking up these subject positions, were found in focus groups or individual interviews rather than in front of their female partners who may have curbed this display of hard masculinity.16 The rst three extracts from young men conceptualize male sexuality as perpetually ready for sex, virile and potent:
Michael: Guys are basically always ready. (FG, NAS, 19) Anabella: I heard some statistics . . . and guys supposedly think of sex, six times an hour on average. Darren: Oh its heaps more than that [all laugh]. (FG, 17, AS) Tina: I have some female friends who are pretty ready to go [have sex].

Barnaby: [Cheekily] Can you introduce me? [all laugh]. (FG, 18, NAS)

Young mens emotional detachment was communicated by the following young man who implied that the best thing about relationships was their nancial benets:
Louisa: Vete: What are some of the best things about being in a relationship? Source of income [all laugh]. (FG, NAS, 19)

A preoccupation with sexual attractiveness in a partner rather than other attributes was revealed during another focus group:
Debbie: If you see a really ugly girl you are not going to bother nding out if she is nice or not. Louisa: Theo: Is that true? Yeah to a certain extent thats fair enough. (FG, mixed, AS)

Tim and Chris who participated in the individual interview positioned themselves as traditionally masculine through the constitution of their bodies as pleasure machines:
Tim: Chris: . . . if I wanted to ejaculate I could probably just do so in less than a minute. (II, NAS, 18) . . . a guy is sort of almost guaranteed to feel good [having sex] you know, feel the same in the end anyway so. (II, NAS, 19)

Sexuality is a central site in mens struggles to become masculine (Holland et al., 1993: 1). This struggle is apparent in the extracts just 225

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given where young men strove for its achievement by appearing always ready for sex, able to ejaculate in less than a minute and professing no emotional investment in relationships. Constructing their sexual selves in this way served to establish themselves publicly as appropriately masculine within/through the realm of (hetero)sexuality. These particular expressions of masculinity may be attributed to the production of heterosexual masculinities. Mac an Ghaill (1994) argues that differentiated heterosexual masculinities are produced and inhabited through the collective actions of boys as they handle or negotiate their concrete social environment, and through relations of similarity with and opposition to other groups within that social environment (cited in Redman, 1996: 174). To achieve full masculine status young men must separate themselves from homosexual and feminine identities. In the quotations given earlier, young men took up subject positions in opposition to female sexuality in their assertion of themselves as all those things female sexuality is traditionally considered as not, virile (Barnaby, Michael), sex obsessed (Darren, Theo), easily physically pleasured (Chris, Tim) and emotionally detached (Vete). In New Zealand heterosexual masculinity is a form of hegemonic masculinity. Hearn and Morgan describe this as . . . the dominance within society of certain forms and practices of masculinity which are historically conditioned and open to change and challenge (Hearn and Morgan, 1995: 179). Hegemonic masculinity is not so much a type of masculinity, but a form of power that sustains gendered inequality because of the way it achieves the consent of a majority of men who support it. Some of the young men in this research recognized their own collusion in the (re)production of this form of power as indicated in the following narrative:
Darren: Guys have got a lot to prove. Theres a lot . . . theres a lot for guys to live up to like uhm gotta be all macho and gotta be cool and all this sort of stuff, gotta score nice chicks or if you have got one chick, you have got to score often. (FG, AS, 18)

This recognition of appropriate forms of masculinity did not mean that young men always did, or could, oppose hegemonic masculinitys operation. However, as the next section indicates, some young men were more likely than others to take up subject positions which did not conform to expressions of masculinity promoted by this hegemony.

Young men resisting dominant discourses of (hetero)sexuality

In opposition to notions that appropriate masculinity involves sexual conquest over women and separation from emotional involvement with 226

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them (Holland et al., 1993: 17) some young men denied sexual intercourse as a primary motive for entering into, or remaining in relationships. This was revealed in the following discussions where young men talked about how sex was not the most important aspect of their relationships. This young man was in a predominately male focus group (one female) where participants were training to be farmers:
Louisa: Is the sex an important part of the relationship?

Richard: Yeah its part of it aye but its not you know just what you are there for. (FG, NAS, 17)

Marcel made this comment while at school in a mixed gender focus group:
Marcel: Its different for, I mean you watch TV and its just sex you know, yeah, sex, but its not just about that really. (FG, AS, 17)

Darren was also at school and a participant in a mixed gender group:

Darren: Its [sex] its not the be all and end all really. (FG, AS, 18)

As a way of emphasizing that sex was not of primary importance in their relationships, the following four young men who participated in the couple interview described how they would remain in their current relationships even without sexual activity:
Peter: Yeah, yeah I mean sex is good, its nice but its not, its not essential. Id still love her, Id still want to be with her. So you know I mean that its nice but I mean if it had to stop then it would, and I would still go out with her. (II, AS, 18) I dont actually think that the sex part affects uhm the relationship. If I couldnt have sex with Cam, well I would still be with Cam cause she makes me really happy. (II, NAS, 19) Im certainly not staying in the relationship for sex. (II, NAS, 19) Like if there was no sex in the relationship youd still be in the relationship? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Its not a, not a big thing. (II, NAS, 17)

Chris:

Tim: Louisa: Neil:

The context within which this decentring of the importance of sexual intercourse took place was (as with the young women) partly attributable to the production of a safe research environment. Most of these comments were offered in individual interviews where the absence of others meant their detrimental impact on young mens masculine identity was reduced. My being a female researcher may have also opened spaces for young men to produce these sorts of narratives because the need to display such forms of masculinity was lessened. It is also likely that young men who volunteer to participate in research on sexuality possess a more 227

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exible sense of sexual self. This is because talking seriously about sex and sexuality is not deemed an appropriately masculine practice, and to do so may require a less rigid adherence to traditional perceptions of masculinity. In addition, all of the young men quoted here described themselves as currently in, or having previous experience of relationships. It is possible that the experience of being in a relationship inuenced their perception of the importance of sexual intercourse in comparison with other aspects (for example, security, commitment, love, increased self-esteem and companionship).17 Chris explained he stayed with Cam not because of sex, but because she makes me happy. He later went on to describe, I was sitting in the park the other day with Cam and we were just messing around wasting hours and I just couldnt believe how good I was feeling, just being there with her. Similarly, Peter who participated in the couple activity and focus group spoke during this session about what was so fullling about his relationship with Amy.
Peter: Just being with somebody and knowing somebody just so well that, you know you can guess what they are thinking and what they are thinking all the time, its just, yeah its like, I feel like when we are together we are a whole person, when I am apart I am half a person. (FG, AS, 18)

The responses of young men to an open-ended survey question which asked them to complete the sentence, what I want in a heterosexual relationship is . . . also indicated many young men in the sample desired more than just sex from relationships (see Table 2). Responses could be coded into themes, with young men mentioning love (30%) as the thing they most wanted in a heterosexual relationship. The next greatest number of mentions was trust, honesty, respect (29%) followed by commitment (27%). While previous research has documented these kinds of relationship qualities as important to young women, they are not typically described as such to young men (McRobbie, 1991).18 In contrast, young men in the questionnaire drew on what I refer to as a happily ever after discourse, where romantic notions of love, commitment, honesty and caring prevailed. The avour of some of these replies can be seen in the following quotations:
Love and close friendship. (AS, 17) Long term love and friendship. Someone to settle down with. (AS, 19) Having someone to love all the time and someone who loves you back. (NAS, 19) A caring, understanding, honest and loving relationship. Stuff that will make both people feel good while respecting their wants and needs. (AS, 18) Understanding, patience, being open and truthful about feelings. (NAS, 19)

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Table 2. What I want in a heterosexual relationship is . . .

Types of things young people want

Mentions Mentions Mentions Young Women Young Men Total N % N % N % (49) (48) (90) (106) (10) (44) (15) (22) (33) (10) (7) (29) (28) (10) (18) (6) 23.9 23.4 43.9 51.7 4.9 21.5 7.3 10.7 16.1 4.9 3.4 14.1 13.7 4.9 8.8 2.9 (32) (29) (20) (31) (4) (20) (9) (26) (12) (6) (6) (7) (8) (7) (6) (3) 30.5 27.6 19.0 29.5 3.8 19.0 8.6 24.8 11.4 5.7 5.7 6.7 7.6 6.7 5.7 2.9 (81) (77) (10) (137) (14) (64) (24) (48) (45) (16) (13) (36) (36) (17) (24) (9) 26.1 24.8 35.5 44.2 4.5 20.6 7.7 15.5 14.5 5.2 4.2 11.6 11.6 5.5 7.7 2.9

Love Commitment Caring, Support, Understanding** Trust, Honesty, Respect** Romance Fun Intimacy Sexual activity/sexual attraction* Companionship/friendship Equality of feelingi Individual space Specic characteristics in a partner Good communication Similar likes and dislikes To be wanted by someone else To feel comfortable

Key ** Signicantly more young women mentioned this. * Signicantly more young men mentioned this. N = Number of mentions. (One answer could potentially have more than one theme.) Total N = 337, Female = 214, Male = 123. i To have someone love you as much as you love them.

Young men also referred to the importance of friendship, communication and equality within a relationship.
Honesty, trust, commitment and a friend. (NAS, 18) Communication. Sharing. (NAS, 19) To be able to talk to each other and be truthful. (NAS, 17) To be equal, romantic, fun loving. (AS, 17) Intimacy, love, friends, partner. (AS, 18) To have fun, be wanted, to enjoy myself, and be myself and be loved for that. (AS, 18)

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Only those who reported engaging in sexual activity, (but not necessarily intercourse) and who described themselves as having had experience of relationships (although these may not have been enduring) were asked to complete this question. Their responses support the idea that experience of sexual relationships may affect young mens priorities about a relationships benets. It might be that for some young men (hetero)relationships offer a context in which less traditional expressions of male sexuality can be played out. To suggest that this constitution of male (hetero)sexuality was the most constant in the research would however ignore the precarious nature of such conceptualizations. For example, other data from this question also hinted at more traditional male sexual subjectivities, with more young men (24%) than young women (10%) reporting they wanted sexual activity and sexual attraction in a (hetero)sexual relationship (sig. 001). Signicantly more young women than young men also reported caring, support, understanding (sig. 000) and trust, honesty, respect, (sig. 000) as what they desired from relationships. These results reveal complexity and uidity in the way young men are positioned within dominant discourses of male (hetero)sexuality. As Connell points out, hegemony does not mean total cultural dominance, the obliteration of alternatives but rather ascendancy achieved within a balance of forces, that is, a state of play (Connell, 1987: 184). This state of play was evident in some young mens narratives where they appeared to simultaneously accommodate and resist traditional constructions of male sexuality. The complexities surrounding such positionings can be seen in the following conversation between a group of young men at school.
Louisa: Tawa: What does it mean to be committed for a guy in a girlfriend/boyfriend relationship? Ball and chain [Vaughn and Tem laugh].

Vaughn: Not that far but getting close to it. Tawa: [Voice changes to serious] Oh being committed thats just uhm dedicating time aye to your girlfriend.

Vaughn: Yeah, yeah. (FG, AS, mixed)

Tawa initially draws on a traditional discourse of male sexuality by implying his lack of interest in commitment and lack of emotional investment in relationships through the ball and chain metaphor. When Vaughn checks Tawas comment with the remark not that far, Tawas tone of voice and attention change to a more serious vein, and he offers that commitment means making time for a girlfriend. Here a softer version of masculinity 230

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is evoked with Tawa giving recognition (or at least lip-service) to the fact that relationships require some input from him. In the course of this moment of discussion the sexual self is constituted through resistant and traditional discursive resources around male sexuality. There is a similar uidity in the construction of sexual self in the next example. Young men in this predominately male focus group were training in agricultural studies:
Louisa: Angus: What reasons would guys have for perhaps not wanting to have sex? Scared that its not going to be good enough [some of the others laugh here].

Richard: Or if they dont do it right probably [laugh]. Louisa: Angus: So is there any pressure then for guys to feel like they have to perform? Not me.

Richard: Oh youre just a studly19 [laugh]. (FG, NAS, mixed)

By suggesting that young men might be worried about their sexual performance Angus resists dominant meanings about men as sexually knowledgeable, condent and always ready for intercourse. When I ask him directly about performance pressure however, he immediately disassociates himself from such anxieties by insisting that he doesnt suffer from this. In so doing, Angus takes up a more traditional sexual subject position for young men as stud. This extract provides another illustration of the way some young men concurrently accommodated and rejected dominant constructions of male sexuality in their talk. This limited data also indicates hegemonic masculinity in operation and the need for young men to manage their sexual identities. In both examples, it is the reaction of other male participants that appears to mediate a shift in the discursive formation of sexual subjectivity. For instance, Vaughns partial disagreement that being committed meant ball and chain and when the mocking laughter of other participants caused Angus to deny any experience of performance anxiety after he had initiated this conversation. These interactions seemed to engender a discursive repositioning which either re-established traditional constructions of male sexuality or opened spaces for resistant subject positions to be taken up.

Conclusion
This research provides insights into the discursive formation of young peoples sexual subjectivities. It suggests that for young people in this study the notion that young women want only love from relationships and young men prefer sex is outdated. Such conceptualizations fail to capture 231

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the complexity of young peoples constitution of the sexual self. While many drew on dominant discourses of heterosexuality in their talk, some provided more resistant constructions of (hetero)sexuality. The nature of these resistances were complex in that they often involved both an accommodation and rejection of subject positions offered by dominant discourses of (hetero)sexuality. While this resistance is made possible through the constitutive force of discourse, the ndings also suggest that such discourses may be deployed as a result of a subjects social location. Particular social locations may have facilitated young peoples access to or opened space for, other ways of constituting themselves as sexual. For example, as in Shona and Annas case being in a progressive environment for teenage mothers, or for some of the young men, having relationship experience. However, this study can only speculate as to why some young people took up these subject positions and others who may also have had access to them did not. In addition, the ndings suggest that more immediate contextual factors may have inuenced whether particular discourses were drawn upon. This was seen in the way young women were more likely to talk about sexual pleasure and an active female sexuality in an environment in which they felt safe to disclose this. Young men drew upon resistant and traditional meanings of male sexuality in response to the reactions of other participants in order to publicly manage their masculine identity. These situations appeared to affect how young people deployed the meanings they had access to about their sexuality. This study offers sexuality education insights into the ways in which some young people talk about their sexual selves. It suggests that we need to acknowledge that these young peoples sexual subjectivities are nuanced in that they do not always neatly conform to traditional notions of passive female and active male (hetero)sexuality. Recognizing this is important for the way in which educational messages and strategies might tap into young peoples sense of themselves as sexual subjects. For example, strategies that presuppose young womens lack of sexual desire or which ignore young mens aspirations for love may miss the mark, as they do not encapsulate some young peoples conceptualization of their sexuality. The research also suggests that young peoples constitution of sexual subjectivity is context bound. If we take the case of young men, their constitution of sexual subjectivity within a public environment and intimate relationship might vary appreciably. The fact that young men may not always take up the subject positions sustained through the operation of hegemonic masculinity could be a strategically useful tool for sexuality education. However, I would argue that this would only be effective if the pressure to appear appropriately masculine is also taken into account in educational messages and strategies. Shaping educational messages in ways 232

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that recognize the diversity and complexity of young peoples conceptualizations of sexual self might subsequently offer a more sophisticated approach to health promotion.

Acknowledgements
This research was funded by a New Zealand Health Research Council Postgraduate Scholarship. I wish to thank the young people who made this research possible and those who facilitated our introductions. Thanks also to the anonymous reviewers whose comments I found insightful.

Notes
1. The ndings referred to in this article are based on a self-identied heterosexual sample. Hetero is bracketed in an attempt to decentre the notion of (hetero)sexual experience as the norm. 2. The World Health Organization estimates that the number of people living with HIV or AIDS at the end of the year 2000 was 36.1 million. This number is 50 per cent higher than projected by this organization in 1991 (WHO, 2000: 4). 3. In New Zealand the Health and Physical Education Curriculum (Ministry of Education, 1999) makes a formal distinction between sexuality and sex education. Sex education generally refers only to the physical dimensions of sexuality education while sexuality education implies a more holistic approach, including the concepts of hauora, health promotion, and a socio-logical perspective. Subsequently the tendency in New Zealand is to refer to sexuality education rather than sex education. Hauora is a Maori philosophy of health unique to New Zealand. It comprises physical, mental, emotional, social and spiritual well-being (Ministry of Education, 1999: 31). 4. See Holland et al., (1994), Kippax et al., (1994), Thomson and Holland (1996), Rosenthal et al., (1998). 5. Total sample was 515 drawn from seven schools and 18 community training programmes. According to their directory these programmes are designed to help people who have low qualications, or limited skills, to gain more independence. 6. Ninety-two subjects took part in focus groups, which were both single sex and mixed gendered. 7. Six couples participated in a couple activity that involved them sorting statements about their relationship (for example: decisions about sexual activity are made equally between us) into piles of sometimes, often or never happens in our relationship. 8. Of the subjects, 57.4 per cent were Pakeha (non-Maori New Zealanders of European descent), 16.3 per cent were from the Pacic Islands, 16.3 per cent were Maori, 9.1 per cent were Asian and 1 per cent other. These reect but do not exactly match the ethnic composition of New Zealands youth in 1996 (see Ministry of Youth Affairs, 1999). 9. Other historical accounts of femininity in New Zealand can be found in

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10. 11.

12.

13. 14.

15. 16.

17.

18.

19.

Brookes et al., (1992); Openshaw and McKenzie, (1987); Brookes et al., (1992). Non-Maori New Zealanders of European descent. By less easily pleasured I refer to the idea generally perpetuated (by traditional discourses already mentioned) that women are seen to nd sexual activity less pleasurable than men. Women supposedly nd it harder to orgasm (or be sexually satised) by sexual activity. Key to narratives: FG = Focus Groups, II = Individual Interview, CA = Couple Activity, Q = Questionnaire, AS = Subjects still at school, NAS = Subjects no longer at school, 17 = 17 years, 18 = 18 years, 19 = 19 years, Mixed = Subjects whose ages are mixed but between 17 and 19 years. See qualication (at beginning of article) of how this positioning occurs and fact that it is not simply an individuals choice. Married with Children is an American sitcom shown on NZ television in the 1990s. It depicts a couple where the husband (Al Bundy) often rebuffs his wifes overtures for sexual activity. See Gavey (1991); Patton and Mannison (1995). There were several occasions when girlfriends appeared to rebuke their boyfriends for macho comments. On one occasion Gabby gave her boyfriend, Theo, a smack on his leg during a group discussion when he suggested that girls were catty while blokes were unconcerned with gossip. These types of benets of a relationship were mentioned in responses from focus group participants to the question Why get involved in a relationship? Recent British research with a younger male age group indicates that young men had greater faith in marriage than young women. When the statement was put to boys: A wife and family of his own is the most satisfying thing that a man can have, a majority of boys from all ethnic groups agreed (ODonnell and Sharpe, 2000: 111). Such ndings also hint at the importance boys attribute to commitment in their relationships. Another name for a stud.

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Biographical Note
Louisa Allen currently holds a Post-Doctoral Fellowship from The Foundation for Research Science and Technology, to design a sexuality education resource for 1619-year-olds. Her research interests are sexuality education, sexualities, masculinities and the body. Louisas recent publications include: The Life of Brian: Masculinities, Sexualities and Health in New Zealand, (2002, joint editor with H. Worth and A Paris) Otago University Press: Otago; Naked Skin Together: Exploring Young Womens Narratives of (Hetero)sexual Pleasure Through a Spectrum of Embodiment (2002) New Zealand Womens Studies Journal 18(11) as well as Closing Sex Educations Knowledge/Practice Gap: The Re-conceptualization of Young Peoples Sexual Knowledge (2001)Sex Education 1(2), Carfax Publishing, Taylor & Francis Group. Address: School of Education, 55 Anzac Avenue, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand. [email: le.allen@auckland.ac.nz]

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