Duke University Press Porn Archives

While sexually explicit writing and art have been around for millennia, pornography―as an aesthetic, moral, and juridical category―is a modern invention. The contributors to Porn Archives explore how the production and proliferation of pornography has been intertwined with the emergence of the archive as a conceptual and physical site for preserving, cataloguing, and transmitting documents and artifacts. By segregating and regulating access to sexually explicit material, archives have helped constitute pornography as a distinct genre. As a result, porn has become a site for the production of knowledge, as well as the production of pleasure. The essays in this collection address the historically and culturally varied interactions between porn and the archive. Topics range from library policies governing access to sexually explicit material to the growing digital archive of "war porn," or eroticized combat imagery; and from same-sex amputee porn to gay black comic book superhero porn. Together the pieces trace pornography as it crosses borders, transforms technologies, consolidates sexual identities, and challenges notions of what counts as legitimate forms of knowledge. The collection concludes with a valuable resource for scholars: a list of pornography archives held by institutions around the world. Contributors. Jennifer Burns Bright, Eugenie Brinkema, Joseph Bristow, Robert Caserio, Ronan Crowley, Tim Dean, Robert Dewhurst, Lisa Downing, Frances Ferguson, Loren Glass, Harri Kahla, Marcia Klotz, Prabha Manuratne, Mireille Miller-Young, Nguyen Tan Hoang, John Paul Ricco, Steven Ruszczycky, Melissa Schindler, Darieck Scott, Caitlin Shanley, Ramon Soto-Crespo, David Squires, Linda Williams Review "Given its grand scope and quality, Porn Archives is sure to quickly become a valuable resource for anyone doing research in pornography studies."--Laura L. S. Bauer "Women's Studies" (7/13/2015 12:00:00 AM) "The consensus in Porn Archives is that the conditions for the production and reception of pornography have changed so radically since the 1980s that the questions feminists were asking about censorship, agency, gender, violence, and power seem today, if not irrelevant, at least in need of a serious makeover. Given the diverse, transnational, cross-media archive that the volume brings together, the argument is persuasive--even to die-hards like me."--Heather Love "Public Books" (10/1/2015 12:00:00 AM) About the Author Tim Dean is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University at Buffalo, where he is also the Director of the Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Culture. He is the author of Unlimited Intimacy: Reflections on the Subculture of Barebacking and Beyond Sexuality. Steven Ruszczycky recently completed a PhD in English at the University at Buffalo, where David Squires is a PhD candidate in English. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Porn Archives By Tim Dean, Steven Ruszczycky, David Squires Duke University Press Copyright © 2014 Duke University Press All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-8223-5671-4 Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, INTRODUCTION - Pornography, Technology, Archive | Tim Dean, PART I - Pedagogical Archives, 1 - Pornography, Porno, Porn: Thoughts on a Weedy Field | Linda Williams, 2 - Pornography as a Utilitarian Social Structure: A Conversation with Frances Ferguson, 3 - The Opening of Kobena, Cecilia, Robert, Linda, Juana, Hoang, and the Others | Nguyen Tan Hoang, 4 - Pornography in the Library | David Squires, PART II - Historical Archives, 5 - "A Quantity of Offensive Matter": Private Cases in Public Places | Jennifer Burns Bright and Ronan Crowley, 6 - Up from Underground | Loren Glass, 7 - "A Few Drops of Thick, White, Viscid Sperm": Teleny and the Defense of the Phallus | Joseph Bristow, PART III - Image Archives, 8 - Art and Pornography: At the Limit of Action | Robert L. Caserio, 9 - Big Bla