ADVANCE PRAISE FOR LESLIE C. BELL’S HARD TO GET
“While popular portrayals of women and sex are glossy, voyeuristic, simplified, unemotional, or trite, Hard to Get offers rarely heard detailed stories told with emotional resonance and connection to women’s full lives and selves. Bell has made a superb contribution to our understanding about how women navigate sexuality in young adulthood in an era when they no longer must be married, and thus she has enlightened our understanding of women’s social, sexual, and psychological lives.”
—Karin A. Martin, author of Puberty, Sexuality, and the Self: Boys and Girls at Adolescence
“Can today’s young women be independent and sexual agents while also satisfying their relational needs for intimacy? Bell believes that they can, and insightfully uses women’s stories to reveal the inner and outer barriers to having it all.”
—Paula England, New York University
“Bell offers a profoundly original and important argument about why—despite gains in education and employment—young women in America continue to be shortchanged in sex and intimacy. And she gives us a new, compelling vision of what it would mean for them to attain true sexual liberation.”
—Amy Schalet, author of Not under My Roof: Parents, Teens, and the Culture of Sex
“Hard to Get is a brilliant intervention into recent debates about women’s sexuality. While theoretically sophisticated, the book is so beautifully written that it is hard to put down. Therapists, sexuality scholars, and young women will find this book a powerful tool in making sense of the pleasures and dissatisfactions of young adulthood today.”
—Elizabeth A. Armstrong, University of Michigan
“Female sexuality provides endless fascination; but how do actual young women find happiness in sex and love? Leslie Bell gives us an up-close look at twenty-something women at a cultural moment when they have more freedom than ever before, but their desires—sexual and relational—continue to confound. Bell navigates this complex terrain with compassion, keen insight, and an eye to social change.”
—Daphne de Marneffe, author of Maternal Desire: On Children, Love, and the Inner Life
Hard to Get
Hard to Get
Twenty-Something Women and
the Paradox of Sexual Freedom
Leslie C. Bell
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
BerkeleyLos AngelesLondon
University of California Press, one of the most distinguished university presses in the United States, enriches lives around the world by advancing scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Its activities are supported by the UC Press Foundation and by philanthropic contributions from individuals and institutions. For more information, visit www.ucpress.edu.
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of California Press, Ltd.
London, England
© 2013 by Leslie C. Bell
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bell, Leslie C., 1970–
Hard to get : twenty-something women and the paradox of sexual freedom / Leslie C. Bell.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-520-26149-5 (cloth : alk. paper)
eISBN 9780520954489
1. Young women--Sexual behavior. 2. Sexual freedom. 3. Man-woman relationships. 4. Sexual ethics. 5. Women--Identity. I. Title.
HQ29.B42 2013
176'.4--dc23
2012028369
Manufactured in the United States of America
22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
In keeping with a commitment to support environmentally responsible and sustainable printing practices, UC Press has printed this book on Natures Natural, a fiber that contains 30% post-consumer waste and meets the minimum requirements of ANSI/NISO z39.48–1992 (R 1997) (Permanence of Paper).
For Alex
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
1. The Paradox of Sexual Freedom
PART I. THE SEXUAL WOMAN
2. The New Taboo: Katie
3. The Bad Girl: Jayanthi
4. A Pill to Kill Desire: Claudia
PART II. THE RELATIONAL WOMAN
5. The Good Girl: Alicia
6. On Not Having It All: Phoebe
PART III. THE DESIRING WOMAN
7. How Does She Do It? Maria and Susan
8. Maybe She’s Born with It: Sophia and Jeanette
9. Conclusion: What’s a Modern Woman to Do?
Appendix I. Splitting
Appendix II. Clinical Interviewing
Appendix III. Demographic Information about Respondents
Notes
References
Index
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Acknowledgments first must go to the women I interviewed, who generously gave of their time and, most important, themselves to participate in this project. Their commitment to and interest in their own developmental processes made conducting the interviews a genuine pleasure. I also thank everyone who helped me to locate respondents, and whose interest and confidence in my work convinced young women to participate.
This book has benefited greatly from discussions with or comments by Natalie Boero, Nancy Chodorow, Marianne Cooper, Margaret Fitzsimmons, Laura Frame, Mark Harris, Meg Jay, Miranda Hoffman Jung, Maureen Katz, Ann Kring, Betsy Lerner, Daphne de Marneffe, Katharine Marshall, Dawne Moon, Elena Moser, Malkah Notman, Catherine Nye, C. J. Pascoe, Raka Ray, Toby Rogers, Cornelia St. John, and Pilar Strutin-Belinoff—gifted thinkers and clinicians who have seen the relevance of this project to a broader audience. Thanks to Lissa Caldwell, Paula England, and four anonymous reviewers whose careful reading and critiques of the manuscript in earlier drafts improved the book’s theoretical rigor and historical grounding. I feel tremendously grateful to Nancy Chodorow, whose mentorship, training, advice, intellect, and criticism are unparalleled. She has insisted that I can have it all.
Deep gratitude to my editor, Naomi Schneider, whose confidence and interest in this project have been as important as her keen editorial eye.
For their friendship and faith in me, I thank Mary Curtin, Margaret Fitzsimmons, Kaethe Morris Hoffer, Kirsten Miley Howell, Meg Jay, Maureen Kelly, Nancy Latham, Lea Queen, Marcy Reda, Julie Rice, Toby Rogers, Julie Shapiro, Juliana Van Cleve, Patti Wiley, and Cara Zeisloft. Special thanks to Rachel Sherman, my fellow traveler through the sociology department, whose discussions with me about sexuality, gender, and psychological processes generally greatly benefited this work, and whose support and love as a friend have been invaluable, and to Miranda Hoffman Jung, whose emotional and intellectual engagement in all things personal and professional has enriched my life immensely.
Thanks to my parents, Kathleen Bell and Wayne Bell, who have unfailingly supported me and had confidence in me, encouraging me always to pursue work that