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In their article, Bělehradová and Lišková take up the important issue of climacteric and post-menopausal women and their sexual pleasure under state socialism in Czechoslovakia. This innovative article sits at the crossroads of... more
In their article, Bělehradová and Lišková take up the important issue of climacteric and post-menopausal women and their sexual pleasure under state socialism in Czechoslovakia. This innovative article sits at the crossroads of anthropology, sociology, and medical history and traces the transnational knowledge networks that informed women's health discourses in the mid-twentieth century. The committee was particular impressed by the way the authors used research on women's sexuality from three Central European countries, Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia, but then also documented how translations of work by American sexologists affected state socialist medical conversations. Giving a thorough background on women's sexual and reproductive health, the authors examine four Czechoslovak medical journals to trace the developing interests of experts in aging women as a new kind of sexual being. The range of sources, the clear organization and writing, and the convincing argument about the need for more such comparative research made this article stand out as superlative.
Příspěvek do Antologie textů k bienále Ve věci umění 2020
A contribution to  the  Biennale Reader Matter of Art 2020
The text is both in Czech and English.
Předmluva ke knize Kristen Ghodsee "Proč mají ženy za socialismu lepší sex"
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Specific developments in reproductive health occurred in Eastern Europe, especially in the second half of the twentieth century. During state socialism, it was experts, not social movements, who furthered the agenda of women’s health and... more
Specific developments in reproductive health occurred in Eastern Europe, especially in the second half of the twentieth century. During state socialism, it was experts, not social movements, who furthered the agenda of women’s health and sexuality. New analyses from the region and written mostly by authors who speak the local languages attest to the wealth of histories, highlighting different timelines of reproductive health developments, the unexpected causes behind them, and the social actors and institutions which played decisive roles.
The paper examines the changes during state socialism in Czechoslovakia in the understanding of the post-reproductive sexuality of women, focusing on the network of medical experts and shifts in expertise, which gave rise to a ‘new kind... more
The paper examines the changes during state socialism in Czechoslovakia in the understanding of the post-reproductive sexuality of women, focusing on the network of medical experts and shifts in expertise, which gave rise to a ‘new kind of person’: sexually active climacteric women. Analyzing the medical press, we show how Czechoslovak experts moved from an exclusive focus on women of reproductive age toward seeing climacteric women first in connection with their working capacities and gynecological health, and over time more as sexual beings. We trace the changes in the broader societal discourse and the shifts in (primarily gynecological) expertise that facilitated a gradual rejection of the stereotypical image of ‘fading’ women and made the emergence of sexually active climacteric women possible. Moreover, we highlight the role of transnational knowledge circulation. We demonstrate how expertise was transformed after Czechoslovak experts became acquainted with the work of the US sexologists Masters and Johnson in the second half of the 1960s. As the systems of knowledge realigned, expertise shifted toward emphasizing the existence and importance of sexual pleasure for (post-)climacteric women. Pointing to similar developments in neighboring countries, we highlight the importance of comparative approaches to state-socialist sexualities.
Over the course of 40 years of state socialism, the explanation that Czechoslovak criminologists gave for spousal murder changed significantly. Initially attributing offences to the perpetrator's class origins, remnants of his bourgeois... more
Over the course of 40 years of state socialism, the explanation that Czechoslovak criminologists gave for spousal murder changed significantly. Initially attributing offences to the perpetrator's class origins, remnants of his bourgeois way of life, and the lack of positive influence from the collective in the long 1950s, criminologists then refocused their attention solely on the individual's psychopathology during the period known as ‘Normalization’, which encompassed the last two decades of state socialism. Based on an analysis of archival sources, including scholarly journals and expert reports, and following Ian Hacking's insight that ‘kinds of people come into being’ through the realignment of systems of knowledge, this article shows how new kinds of spousal murderer emerged as a result of shifting criminological expertise. We explain the change as the result of the psychiatrization of criminology that occurred in Czechoslovakia at a time when the regime needed to consolidate after the upheavals of the Prague Spring of 1968. The criminological framing of spousal murder as belonging squarely in the individualized realm of the private sphere reflected the contemporaneous effort of the regime to enclose the private as a sphere of relative state non-interference.
269 © Sociologický ústav AV ČR, v.v.i., Praha 2013 Tradice, její rozpad a záchrana skrze sex: Diskurzivní strategie odpůrců sexuální výchovy* LUCIE JARKOVSKÁ, KATEŘINA LIŠKOVÁ** Fakulta sociálních studií, Masarykova univerzita, Brno The... more
269 © Sociologický ústav AV ČR, v.v.i., Praha 2013 Tradice, její rozpad a záchrana skrze sex: Diskurzivní strategie odpůrců sexuální výchovy* LUCIE JARKOVSKÁ, KATEŘINA LIŠKOVÁ** Fakulta sociálních studií, Masarykova univerzita, Brno The Demise of Tradition and Its Salvation through Sex: The Discursive Strategies of Opponents of Sex Education Abstract: In 2010 sex education became a surprising target of criticism in the secular Czech Republic. The voices of social conservatives were raised and were answered by the Minister of Education, who launched a reform of edu- cational curricula to exclude sex education. This article analyses the discursive strategies employed by conservative opponents of sex education and high- lights the interpretive repertoires of sexuality and gender. The authors argue that Czech conservatives deploy both a moral panic strategy and a discursive strategy of empowerment that uses positive sanctions to support ‘good sex’, defi ned exclusively as marital, procr...
In this chapter, I focus on three moments of innovation brought about by sexological expertise during state socialism in three countries: Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary. Drawing upon years of collaborative research and using the... more
In this chapter, I focus on three moments of innovation brought about by sexological expertise during state socialism in three countries: Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary. Drawing upon years of collaborative research and using the examples of the female orgasm in Czechoslovakia in the 1950s, abortion in Poland at the turn of the 1950s and 1960s, and open marriage in Hungary in the late 1970s, I show both similarities and differences in the ways sexuality was seen in various countries over time. I highlight the role sexologists played in how sexual matters were taken up by people and, importantly, perceived by the state actors and, as a result, incorporated into laws and policies. In effect, I argue that through understanding expertise, we can understand the (changing) emphases of the state. In other words, by studying the most intimate (as it is represented in sexuality), we can understand the most public (as it is represented by the state).
Specific developments in reproductive health occurred in Eastern Europe, especially in the second half of the twentieth century. During state socialism, it was experts, not social movements, who furthered the agenda of women’s health and... more
Specific developments in reproductive health occurred in Eastern Europe, especially in the second half of the twentieth century. During state socialism, it was experts, not social movements, who furthered the agenda of women’s health and sexuality. New analyses from the region and written mostly by authors who speak the local languages attest to the wealth of histories, highlighting different timelines of reproductive health developments, the unexpected causes behind them, and the social actors and institutions which played decisive roles.
First, we argue that sexuality was central to socialist modernization: Sex and gender were reformulated whenever the socialist project was being revised. Expertise was crucial in these reformulations, which harnessed people's support for... more
First, we argue that sexuality was central to socialist modernization: Sex and gender were reformulated whenever the socialist project was being revised. Expertise was crucial in these reformulations, which harnessed people's support for the changing regimes. Moreover, the role of the expert in society grew over time, leading to ever expanding and diversified fields of expertise. Second, gender and sexuality stood disjointed in these changes. Whereas in the early 1950s sex was a taboo subject in Hungary, in the last three decades of socialism it was gradually acknowledged and emancipated, along with a discursive push to alter gender roles within marriage. Conversely, Czechoslovak experts paid close attention to sexuality and particularly to female pleasure from the outset of the regime, highlighting the benefits of gender equality for conjugal satisfaction; yet, they changed course with Normalization (1969-1989) when they embraced gender hierarchy as the structure for a good marriage and a fulfilling sex life. It follows that gender and sexuality can develop independently: Change in one is not necessarily bound to similar progress in the other. Thus, third, whereas there was a shared initial push for gender equality, there was no unified socialist drive for the liberalization of sexuality.
This chapter gives a comprehensive overview of the developments regarding women in South-East-Central Europe over the course of the long 20th century. The status of women changed dramatically over the course of the long twentieth century.... more
This chapter gives a comprehensive overview of the developments regarding women in South-East-Central Europe over the course of the long 20th century. The status of women changed dramatically over the course of the long twentieth century. Women’s social standing improved overall in the public and private spheres, although rather unevenly in the various segments of social life.

Challenges of Modernity offers a broad account of the social and economic history of Central and Eastern Europe in the twentieth century and asks critical questions about the structure and experience of modernity in different contexts and periods.

This volume focuses on central questions such as: How did the various aspects of modernity manifest themselves in the region, and what were their limits? How was the multifaceted transition from a mainly agrarian to an industrial and post-industrial society experienced and perceived by historical subjects? Did Central and Eastern Europe in fact approximate its dream of modernity in the twentieth century despite all the reversals, detours and third-way visions? Structured chronologically and taking a comparative approach, a range of international contributors combine a focus on the overarching problems of the region with a discussion of individual countries and societies, offering the reader a comprehensive, nuanced survey of the social and economic history of this complex region in the recent past.

The first in a four-volume set on Central and Eastern Europe in the twentieth century, it is the go-to resource for those interested in the ‘challenges of modernity‘ faced by this dynamic region.
Was there a state-socialist model of school sex education and if so, what characterized its form and content? What shaped the specifi-cities and divergent characteristics of each country? The paper explores and compares programs of... more
Was there a state-socialist model of school sex education and if so, what characterized its form and content? What shaped the specifi-cities and divergent characteristics of each country? The paper explores and compares programs of 'education for family life' as these became part of state-driven reproductive politics in late stages of state socialism in three countries (Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary), with a particular focus on sexuality and gender. We analyze how sexuality was framed in these otherwise broadly understood programs, which aimed not just at discussing sex but also interper-sonal relations within the family, forming the ways in which gender was to be understood, and sexuality was to be practiced. We show that school curricula for education for family life, which included sexual education, were introduced in the early 1970s in all three countries, and these programs displayed many similarities. We identify transnational influences in triggering the interest in such type of education and cross-border exchanges that shaped it further. Nevertheless, when analyzing the content of these curri-cula, national factors and peculiarities become visible, like the heightened focus on 'normal' family life in Czechoslovakia, the importance of ethnicity (Roma minority) in Hungary or religion (Catholicism) in Poland. As a result, we cannot speak of a universal model of state-socialist sex education. Methodologically, we follow the sociology of expertise that focuses on the ways in which expertise forms, links or disjoins, creating new areas of social life in need of expert intervention (Eyal, Rose, Hacking). Changes in expertise thus map onto broader social changes and analyzing the shifts in expertise can help understand societal processes of social reproduction and change. In our paper, we focus on sexological and pedagogical expertise, as these intersected on the issue of school-based sex education.
The Czech Republic holds one of the highest numbers of men labelled as sexual delinquents worldwide who have undergone the irreversible process of surgical castration-a policy that has elicited strong international criticism.... more
The Czech Republic holds one of the highest numbers of men labelled as sexual delinquents worldwide who have undergone the irreversible process of surgical castration-a policy that has elicited strong international criticism. Nevertheless, Czech sexology has not changed its attitude towards 'therapeutic castration', which remains widely accepted and practised. In this paper, we analyse the negotiation of expertise supporting castration and demonstrate how the changes in institutional matrices and networks of experts (Eyal 2013) have impacted the categorisation of patients and the methods of treatment. Our research shows the great importance of historical development that tied Czech sexology with the state. Indeed, Czech sexology has been profoundly institutionalised since the early 1970s. In accordance with the state politics of that era, officially named Normalisation, sexology focused on sexual deviants and began creating a treatment programme that included therapeutic castration. This practice, the aim of which is to protect society from sex offenders, has changed little since. We argue that it is the expert-state alliance that enables Czech sexologists to preserve the status quo in the treatment of sexual delinquents despite international pressure. Our research underscores the continuity in medical practice despite the regime change in 1989. With regard to previous scholarship on state-socialist Czechoslovakia, we argue that it was the medical mainstream that developed and sustained disciplining and punitive features.
In academic writing, facts about the past generally require the citation of relevant sources unless the fact or idea is considered " common knowledge: " bits of information or dates upon which there is a wide scholarly consensus. This... more
In academic writing, facts about the past generally require the citation of relevant sources unless the fact or idea is considered " common knowledge: " bits of information or dates upon which there is a wide scholarly consensus. This brief article reflects on the use of " common knowledge " claims in contemporary scholarship about women, families, and sexuality as experienced during 20 th century, East European, state socialist regimes. We focus on several key stereotypes about the communist state and the situation of women that are often asserted in the scholarly literature, and argue that many of these ideas uncannily resemble American anti-communist propaganda. When contemporary scholars make claims about communist intrusions into the private sphere to effect social engineering or the inefficacy of state socialist mass organizations or communist efforts to break up the family or indoctrinate the young, they often do so without citation to previous sources or empirical evidence supporting their claims, thereby suggesting that such claims are " common knowledge. " We believe that those wishing to assert such claims should link these assertions to concrete originating sources, lest it turn out the " common knowledge " derives, in fact, from western Cold War rhetoric.
Despite its historical focus on aberrant behavior, sexology barely dealt with sexual deviants in 1950s Czechoslovakia. Rather, sexologists only treated isolated instances of deviance. The rare cases that went to court appeared mostly... more
Despite its historical focus on aberrant behavior, sexology barely dealt with sexual deviants in 1950s Czechoslovakia. Rather, sexologists only treated isolated instances of deviance. The rare cases that went to court appeared mostly because they hindered work or harmed the national economy. Two decades later, however, the situation was markedly different. Hundreds of men were labeled as sexual delinquents and sentenced for treatment in special sexological wards at psychiatric hospitals. They endangered society, so it was claimed, by being unwilling or unable to conform to the family norm. The mode of subjection shifted from work to family. I analyze this change by using the tools of Gil Eyal’s sociology of expertise (2013), which focuses on shifts in institutional matrices that bring forth new groups of agents creating new expert networks. I argue that sexology became profoundly institutionalized in the early 1970s, which brought the discipline closer to psychiatry and forensic science. New inpatient facilities were opened that could admit sentenced sexual deviants. Also, demographic changes accelerated in the 1960s, especially skyrocketing divorce rates and plummeting birth
rates, which made it imperative for the government to focus on cementing the family. After the failed attempts of Prague Spring in 1968, the new pro-Soviet government of communist Czechoslovakia did just that. During the time dubbed as “normalization” by the new elites, anyone who strayed from the family norm was suspected of deviance.
Sexuality in communist Czechoslovakia was to a large extent informed by an expert discourse of sexology. Analyzing sexual advice books published by sexologists for the general public in the 1950s and 1970s, I show that sexual discourses... more
Sexuality in communist Czechoslovakia was to a large extent informed by an expert discourse of sexology. Analyzing sexual advice books published by sexologists for the general public in the 1950s and 1970s, I show that sexual discourses were formed in a
reversed order of liberalization vs. conservatism as compared to the West. While writing on sex in Czechoslovakia in the 1950s stressed gender equality and emancipation of women, the
texts published in the 1970s insisted on the necessity of gender hierarchy for a successful marriage and defended privatized families isolated from larger society. I link these shifts to
the changing character of the regime which moved from accentuating public, work and equality in the 1950s to emphasizing private, family and authority in the 1970s. For my
analysis, I use the concepts of psy-ences (Rose, 1992, 1996) and intimacy at the intersection of the public/private divide (Berlant and Warner, 1998), while also accounting for their blind spots. Where Rose insists that psy-ences have operated exclusively in modern liberal capitalist societies, I argue that a psy-ence of sexology also co-constituted social life under state socialism. My paper analyzes Czechoslovak sexual and gender trajectories and accounts for differences from and convergences with 20th century Western histories of sexuality. I critically examine Czechoslovak sexological discourses in their changing historical settings to
show that there was not one ‘communist period’, even in one country. Rather there existed varying modes of framing sexuality at different times.
This article argues that the Czech education system is structured to operate in an ethnically homogeneous society. Although the Czech Republic is becoming increasingly heterogeneous, teachers deploy discursive practices of ‛sameness... more
This article argues that the Czech education system is structured to operate in an ethnically homogeneous society. Although the Czech Republic is becoming increasingly heterogeneous, teachers deploy discursive practices of ‛sameness despite difference’ that obscure such growing
diversity. This article is grounded in the historical context of migration to and from the Czech Republic and based on ethnographic research in several ethnically-mixed classrooms. We analyze the ways in which teachers talk about their pupils. We show that in the case of migrant children, teachers tend not to see their differences and hence, their potentially structural disadvantages. On the other hand, the Roma ethnicity is perceived as insurmountable. Teachers mobilize lists of cultural
and even genetic differences to legitimize their different treatment of Roma pupils. Furthermore, we analyze policy documents regarding the education of non-Czech pupils and their reception by teachers. All these strategies result in the continuing perception of Czech classrooms as ethnically homogeneous while disregarding any social inequalities.
Doctors studying human sexuality in both East and West met at the first international conference – “Symposium sexuologicum pragense” – in Prague during the spring of a watershed year of 1968. Over 300 experts form 19 countries on 4... more
Doctors studying human sexuality in both East and West met at the first international conference – “Symposium sexuologicum pragense” – in Prague during the spring of a watershed year of 1968. Over 300 experts form 19 countries on 4 continents attended. They convened to discuss…. While Western scholars highlighted rather biological roots to sexuality and its aberrations, experts from the East asserted their understanding of sex as formed by and intertwined with social arrangements. How to make sense of this discord in the perception of sex? And was it really a vast difference?
My paper is an analysis of contemporary Czech expert discourses on love and coupledom, framed within ongoing feminist discussions of sociological theory's emphasis on the individualization, reflexivity and detraditionalization of gender.... more
My paper is an analysis of contemporary Czech expert discourses on love and coupledom, framed within ongoing feminist discussions of sociological theory's emphasis on the individualization, reflexivity and detraditionalization of gender. Using Bourdieu's notion of symbolic violence, I argue for understanding therapeutic discourses as perlocutionary speech acts that authoritatively enact gendered norms and heteronormative assumptions. This performative approach both challenges heightened reflexivity theory by pointing to its flawed voluntarism, and also allows for grasping transformation through fissures between a perlocutionary act and its reception.
Questions of gender and sexuality are currently being addressed by discourses of science and law enforcement with the ultimate aim of defining and controlling sexual citizenship. Criminological discourse in particular relies heavily on... more
Questions of gender and sexuality are currently being addressed by discourses of science and law enforcement with the ultimate aim of defining and controlling sexual citizenship. Criminological discourse in particular relies heavily on presumably shared notions of cultural norms regarding what constitutes non-offensive and moral sexuality. Interconnected with the scientific notions of natural, healthy and mature sexuality that are offered by sexology, they together constitute a disciplinary power that attributes normalcy and legality to the conduct of some, and pathology or criminality to others. My paper is a sociological analysis of the discourses of pornography produced by both sexology and criminology in the contemporary Czech Republic. My aim is to analyze two recent books dealing with pornography written by well-known Czech sexologists and criminologists. My paper is organized around three main topics: 1) sexuality, morality and social cohesion; 2) scientific discourses and their liberatory versus status quo preserving potential concerning (gender) normality; 3) the resonance of sexological and criminological discourse with anti-porn feminism.
The period of Normalization in Czechoslovakia is often perceived as a grey “Eastern iceberg” where life stood still and uniformity governed. My analysis of sexological discourse, particularly of texts focused on perversity, juxtaposes the... more
The period of Normalization in Czechoslovakia is often perceived as a grey “Eastern iceberg” where life stood still and uniformity governed. My analysis of sexological discourse, particularly of texts focused on perversity, juxtaposes the normalized ethos of the period with deviant sexual subjectivities. I analyze papers and debates presented at annual sexological conferences in the 1970s and 1980s. Sexuality, especially in its non-normal/deviant forms, was revealed as unstable, a quality sought to be “rectified” through gender which was perceived as binary. The family was interrogated as a source of deviance and also as a place of redress. While sexological writings in general tend to biologize sexuality, my analysis shows that sexologists attributed social genealogy to deviance, a finding that attests to rigid social conditions during Normalization.
Censorship of sexually explicit imagery is currently being called for, not by conservatives, but paradoxically by feminists. In various places throughout Europe, feminist groups have launched campaigns against pornography; campaigns which... more
Censorship of sexually explicit imagery is currently being called for, not by conservatives, but paradoxically by feminists. In various places throughout Europe, feminist groups have launched campaigns against pornography; campaigns which they conceive in terms of crimes against women, discrimination, humiliation, and especially the silencing of women by men. Anti-porn feminists declare the domination of women to be the only, unfailing, and all-powerful effect pornography has always had, and the only it ever can have. Not only do these efforts reproduce ”man-woman”, “either-or” binaries, they also construct women as mute by definition - unable to use language in order to enhance their own agency. This paper explores the capacity of porn to impose silence, the unexpected results a discourse of domination may trigger, and the other ways a “woman” can use language. My analysis of feminist anti-porn arguments - both current European and older American examples - is based on Pierre Bourdieu´s concepts of language and symbolic power.
Research Interests:
V tomto článku si všímáme toho, jak se český vzdělávací systém vy- pořádává s rostoucí etnickou různorodostí. Zaměřujeme se přitom jak na perspektivu pedagogů, kteří učí ve třídách navštěvovaných dětmi migranty z Ukrajiny, Ruska,... more
V tomto článku si všímáme toho, jak se český vzdělávací systém vy- pořádává s rostoucí etnickou různorodostí. Zaměřujeme se přitom jak na perspektivu pedagogů, kteří učí ve třídách navštěvovaných dětmi migranty z Ukrajiny, Ruska, Vietnamu, tak na perspektivu samotných dětí migrantů a jejich spolužáků. Předkládáme výsledky analýzy dat získaných v průběhu etnografického výzkumu na vybraných školách po celé České republice. Vedle individuálních rozho- vorů s pedagogy jsou to zejména skupinové rozhovory s dětmi, v nichž identifikujeme diskurzivní strategie a repertoáry charakteristické zneviditelňováním etnicity a udržováním představy etnicky homogenního celku. Cílem tohoto článku je analýza procesů zneviditelňování etnicity, které je v pro- mluvách pedagogů spojeno s humanistickým rámováním osobnosti žáka a u samotných žáků migrantů se projevují performováním normálnosti a bezproblémovosti, která ovšem musí být stvrzena jejich českými spolužáky. Etnickou různorodost v českých školách chápeme jako prostoupenou diskurzem stejnosti navzdory různosti.
Analýza focus groups se žákyněmi a žáky 9. tříd, které navštěvovaly rovněž děti z národnostně/etnicky různých skupin (vietnamské, ukrajinské/ruské, romské), zkoumá prostřednictvím diskurzně-analytických metod způsoby konstruování... more
Analýza focus groups se žákyněmi a žáky 9. tříd, které navštěvovaly rovněž děti z národnostně/etnicky různých skupin (vietnamské, ukrajinské/ruské, romské), zkoumá prostřednictvím diskurzně-analytických metod způsoby konstruování národnosti/etnicity. Identifikuje tři klíčová témata: téma jazyka jako nástroje inkluze a exkluze, téma konstrukce in-group a out-group a téma kultury, respektive její konstrukce v kontextu jinakosti/stejnosti. Na základě provedené analýzy ukazuji, že zvládnutí jazyka majority je mluvčími identifikováno jako hlavní nástroj inkluze, ale rodný jazyk zůstává ukazatelem esenciální pravdy o identitě daného jednotlivce. Ve snaze o inkluzi do in-group používají národnostně/etnicky „jiní“ nejčastěji diskurzivní strategie vlastní normálnosti a podobnosti příslušníkům majority, zatímco „domorodci“ nejčastěji mobilizují diskurz individualizace, aby ukázali sebe jako tolerantní jedince a zároveň aby identifikovali „dobré“ a „špatné“ příslušníky „jiné/ho“ etnika/národnosti. Kultura podobně jako biologie slouží především k vysvětlení odlišností mezi lidmi; zajímavý diskurzivní prostor v tomto smyslu skýtá kategorie psychického „vnitřku“, který může být využit k promýšlení podobnosti lidí a rovnosti mezi nimi.
Numerous Czech studies have been conducted on how the educa- tion system reproduces inequalities. While most of them have dealt with the reproduction of class inequalities, relatively few have focused on the repro- duction of gender... more
Numerous Czech studies have been conducted on how the educa- tion system reproduces inequalities. While most of them have dealt with the reproduction of class inequalities, relatively few have focused on the repro- duction of gender inequalities. In this article, the authors apply a conceptual understanding of the category of gender to research on education, an approach that avoids both universalising the category of woman, as well as the opposite extreme of individualisation. We claim that female students, even though they differ among themselves in various social and personal ways, are serialised as women by institutions in the education system. They are expected to perform differently, with different motivations, their performance is valued differently and they are expected to follow different professions than male students. The paper focuses in detail on the gendered nature of educational institutions, both in terms of the gender segregation of fields and levels of study, as well as in terms of the importance of the interaction that occurs during the processes of teaching and ascribing value and significance to the performance of male and female students. The authors argue that education, generally expected to function as a social ladder and a route to better-paid jobs in the labour market, serves men and women in segregated ways.
In 2010 sex education became a surprising target of criticism in the secular Czech Republic. The voices of social conservatives were raised and were answered by the Minister of Education, who launched a reform of educational curricula to... more
In 2010 sex education became a surprising target of criticism in the secular Czech Republic. The voices of social conservatives were raised and were answered by the Minister of Education, who launched a reform of educational curricula to exclude sex education. This article analyses the discursive strategies employed by conservative opponents of sex education and highlights the interpretive repertoires of sexuality and gender. The authors argue that Czech conservatives deploy both a moral panic strategy and a discursive strategy of empowerment that uses positive sanctions to support ‘good sex’, defined exclusively as marital, procreative heterosex. This interpretive repertoire of ‘good and healthy sexuality’ is universally intelligible and thus has the potential to resonate not only with social conservatives but throughout society. When combined with other socially conservative agendas it has the capacity to regiment the public space and diminish the role of public institutions.
This paper analyzes pornography as an object of the discourses of sexology, criminology, and anti-porn feminism while highlighting the unexpected resonances between them. First, it analyzes sexuality as a means of social cohesion,... more
This paper analyzes pornography as an object of the discourses of sexology, criminology, and anti-porn feminism while highlighting the unexpected resonances between them. First, it analyzes sexuality as a means of social cohesion, identified as such by the normative disciplines of sexology and criminology. Second, it proceeds to examine the scientific aspirations of sexology that help to legitimize sexological claims regarding sexual normalcy and deviance. Third, it focuses on the points where sexological categorization reproduces and further strengthens the gender binary. Finally, it explores the zones where malestream scholarship overlaps with feminist theorizing.
Obsah a Předmluva k českému vydání
This is the first account of sexual liberation in Eastern Europe during the Cold War. Kateřina Lišková reveals how, in the case of Czechoslovakia, important aspects of sexuality were already liberated during the 1950s-abortion was... more
This is the first account of sexual liberation in Eastern Europe during the Cold War. Kateřina Lišková reveals how, in the case of Czechoslovakia, important aspects of sexuality were already liberated during the 1950s-abortion was legalized, homosexuality decriminalized, the female orgasm came into experts' focus-and all that was underscored by an emphasis on gender equality. However, with the coming of Normalization, gender discourses reversed and women were to aspire to be caring mothers and docile wives. Good sex was to cement a lasting marriage and family. In contrast to the usual Western accounts highlighting the importance of social movements to sexual and gender freedom, here we discover, through the analysis of rich archival sources covering forty years of state socialism in Czechoslovakia, how experts, including sexologists, demographers, and psychologists, advised the state on population development, marriage and the family to shape the most intimate aspects of people's lives.
2018 by Cambridge University Press
Research Interests:
Kniha přináší sociologickou analýzu antipornografického feministického diskursu. Tato analýza se zaměřuje jednak na pojetí genderu a sexuality, jednak na chápání performativity v kontextu symbolické moci řečových aktů. Autorka kriticky... more
Kniha přináší sociologickou analýzu antipornografického feministického diskursu. Tato analýza se zaměřuje jednak na pojetí genderu a sexuality, jednak na chápání performativity v kontextu symbolické moci řečových aktů. Autorka kriticky analyzuje koncept genderu a jeho propojení se sexualitou tak, jak je (explicitně i implicitně) přináší antipornografický feminismus. Věnuje se také současnému antipornografickému diskursu v České republice. Analyzuje proto práce z oborů sexuologie a kriminologie na téma pornografie. Současnému českému diskursu o pornografii totiž dominují tyto obory, nikoli feministický diskurs, nicméně oba překvapivě s antipornografickým feminismem rezonují. V poslední části knihy autorka kriticky analyzuje uvažování o pornografii jako o performativním projevu, tedy konající řeči, a posuzuje jednotlivé výhody i jednotlivá omezení tohoto přístupu. Škodí pornografie ženám? Dehumanizuje porno ženy? Je pornografie v rozporu s feminismem? Jakou podobu mají debaty o pornu v současné české společnosti? Koná porno v sociální realitě? Formuje nějak svět kolem nás? Co se stane, když je do hry o pornografii zatažen stát?
Kniha se věnuje vzdělávání a trhu práce, které zkoumá jako provázané systémy. Jádrem knihy je kvalitativní výzkum, provedený v rodinách a školách patnáctiletých dívek a chlapců, který je zasazen do kontextu současných českých a evropských... more
Kniha se věnuje vzdělávání a trhu práce, které zkoumá jako provázané systémy. Jádrem knihy je kvalitativní výzkum, provedený v rodinách a školách patnáctiletých dívek a chlapců, který je zasazen do kontextu současných českých a evropských výzkumů o genderovanosti vzdělávacího systému a sféry placené práce. Výzkum se zabýval problémem rozhodování o střední škole a budoucím povolání dívek a chlapců na konci povinné školní docházky. Autorky se zaměřily na jejich očekávání, na jejich vysněné školy a zaměstnání, na volby, které skutečně udělali i na bariéry, které jim stojí v cestě a na způsoby jejich překonávání. Poznatky z výzkumu jsou ukotveny jak v sociologických teoriích akcentujících propojenost sociální struktury s jednáním jednotlivých aktérů a aktérek, tak ve feministických přístupech zdůrazňujících nutnost sociální změny směrem k rovné a spravedlivé společnosti. Funguje vzdělání jako výtah, který vynáší na vyšší příčky sociální hierarchie, nebo jde o nástroj, který sociální rozdíly konzervuje? Jak a v čem se proměňuje situace žen a mužů ve vzdělávání? Zaručuje ženám vyšší vzdělání lepší situaci na trhu práce? Jak se gender projevuje ve školní každodennosti? Lze směřování studujících do tzv. dívčích a chlapeckých oborů vnímat jako svobodnou volbu, anebo jde o strukturní jev? Mají na volbu dalšího vzdělání žáků a žákyň vliv úvahy o budoucí vlastní rodině? Směřují všechny dívky a chlapci na genderově „typické“ obory? Jak vypadá pracovní situace těch, kdo se rozhodli pro genderově netypické povolání? Kdo jsou mladí lidé, kteří nedělají genderově očekávatelné volby?
Surprisingly, sexuality has not been at the centre of scholarship on postwar Central and Eastern Europe. While neighbouring topics, such as gender or everyday life, have been thoroughly and wonderfully researched (the list here is too... more
Surprisingly, sexuality has not been at the centre of scholarship on postwar Central and Eastern Europe. While neighbouring topics, such as gender or everyday life, have been thoroughly and wonderfully researched (the list here is too long, but let me mention at least some shining examples 1), sexuality somehow escaped the spotlight. Path-breaking research done by Dagmar Herzog on East Germany 2 or Dan Healey on Soviet Russia 3 was for a long time not followed by similar examinations focusing on other countries from the region. The situation is beginning to change. As the Foucauldian insight, well-known to historians and social scientists, teaches us: it is precisely through sexuality that we can understand power the best. So, it is high time that we received exciting new studies of how power during the Cold War operated through sex and sexual discourses, both in the East and West. What we learn from the five insightful books under review is the degree of authority experts wielded over sex in socialist countries, how entangled sexual and religious discourses were even in manifestly non-religious socialist countries and how sex served to paint the socialist East as backward in Cold War struggles and beyond. Reading these books, we learn how sexuality developed