Single-at-midlife Women and Their Accounts of Their Sexual Lives
| atmire.migration.oldid | 4362 | |
| dc.contributor.advisor | Radtke, H. Lorraine | |
| dc.contributor.author | Moore, Jennifer Andrea | |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Stam, Hank | |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | McCoy, Liza | |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Schneider, Barbara | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2016-05-03T18:08:07Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2016-05-03T18:08:07Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2016 | |
| dc.date.submitted | 2016 | en |
| dc.description.abstract | Despite the burgeoning research interest in single women’s lives, few studies have examined the sexual lives of midlife women who are without a committed sexual partner. What is little understood then is how midlife women who are single understand their sexuality and their sexual relationships. Adopting a social constructionist framework and a discourse analytic perspective, this study explored the accounts of 21 women who identified as “women alone,” were in “early midlife” (aged 35-50 years), and lived in cities and towns across Canada. The women were interviewed using a semi-structured format, either in person, by phone, or by Skype, and the interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed. The analysis examined the varied and contradictory discourses of heterosexuality that the participants used to account for their sexual practices and position themselves as sexual subjects. Study results suggest that cultural changes of recent decades have entailed shifts in the discursive environment beyond the cultural resources identified by Wendy Hollway in the 1980s, i.e., “male sexual drive,” “have and hold,” and “permissive sex” discourses. Women understood their sexuality in terms of a “compulsory sexuality” that is produced by the permissive sex and “sexological” discourses and constructs sex as integral to women’s lives. For single women, this means remaining sexually attractive and youthful according to the standards of the day, a subject position that is at odds with their positioning as “maturing” women. Being positioned as “celibate” or “sexually inactive” was a “troubled” identity, and the participants navigated this tension by drawing on two “emerging” discourses, “caring sex” (i.e., “good” and “fulfilling”’ sex that includes feelings and practices of care, respect, and reciprocity) and “New Age spirituality” (i.e., compatibility, intimacy, and soul mates). Together, these discourses provided a discursive space for women to account for their sexual subjectivity outside of committed romantic relationships in a way that allowed them to be both “sexual” and “moral women.” Women’s single and midlife sexual subjectivity is discussed in the context of contemporary “postfeminist discourses” that construct female sexuality as active and empowered. | en_US |
| dc.identifier.citation | Moore, J. A. (2016). Single-at-midlife Women and Their Accounts of Their Sexual Lives (Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/27792 | en_US |
| dc.identifier.doi | http://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/27792 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/11023/2948 | |
| dc.language.iso | eng | |
| dc.publisher.faculty | Graduate Studies | |
| dc.publisher.institution | University of Calgary | en |
| dc.publisher.place | Calgary | en |
| dc.rights | University of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission. | |
| dc.subject | Gender Studies | |
| dc.subject | WomenÕs Studies | |
| dc.subject | Psychology | |
| dc.subject | Psychology--Social | |
| dc.subject.classification | singleness | en_US |
| dc.subject.classification | single women | en_US |
| dc.subject.classification | sexuality | en_US |
| dc.subject.classification | discourse analysis | en_US |
| dc.subject.classification | postfeminism | en_US |
| dc.subject.classification | Gender | en_US |
| dc.subject.classification | midlife | en_US |
| dc.title | Single-at-midlife Women and Their Accounts of Their Sexual Lives | |
| dc.type | doctoral thesis | |
| thesis.degree.discipline | Psychology | |
| thesis.degree.grantor | University of Calgary | |
| thesis.degree.name | Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) | |
| ucalgary.item.requestcopy | true |