Vita Sexualis

Karl Ulrichs and the Origins of Sexual Science

Vita Sexualis
Ralph M Leck
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NZ$ 84.99
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Paperback
h235 x 156mm - 304pg
9 Mar 2020 US
9780252085161
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Karl Ulrichs's studies of sexual diversity galvanized the burgeoning field of sexual science in the nineteenth century. But in the years since, his groundbreaking activism for the emancipation of homosexuality has overshadowed his scholarly achievements.Ralph M. Leck returns Ulrichs to his place as the inventor of the science of sexual heterogeneity. Leck's analysis situates sexual science in thematic contexts that include political history, aesthetics, amatory studies, and the language of science. Although he was the greatest nineteenth-century scholar of sexual heterogeneity, Ulrichs retained certain traditional conjectures about gender. Leck recognizes these subtleties and employs the analytical concepts of modernist vita sexualis and traditional psychopathia sexualis to articulate philosophical and cultural differences among sexologists.Original and audacious, Vita Sexualis uses a bedrock figure's scientific and political innovations to open new insights into the history of sexual science, legal systems, and Western amatory codes.
"[Vita Sexualis] provides a strikingly affirmative alternative to much recent postmodern discourse. . . . For any student of gay history and liberation, this refreshing work will prove instructive and will, I predict, be viewed as a key text pointing toward a new literature on the revolutionary nature of gay identity arising after three decades of nihilistic post-modernism."--Gay & Lesbian Review
"A superlatively researched, richly detailed history of sexual science from its start in the late-1800s through the mid-1900s. . . . Highly recommended."--Choice
"This book includes interesting concepts and theories about a long-forgotten person of interest in Western Sexology."--ISIS
"An intriguing study with a quite synthetic thesis and extremely erudite analysis. Will be of interest to a wide range of scholars: historians of medicine, science, sexuality, various branches of philosophy, as well as cultural and social historians
"Ralph Leck tackles the contributions of Karl Heinrich Ulrichs to sexual science with erudition and passion. Vita Sexualis gives Ulrichs his rightful place in the story of the struggle to conceptualize homosexuality as a natural sexual variat

Ralph M. Leck has taught for many years in the University Honors Program at Indiana State University. He is the former director of Peace and Justice Studies at Marian University, Indianapolis. He is the author of Georg Simmel and Avant-Garde Sociology: The Birth of Modernity, 1880-1920.

Status: Active
ISBN-13: 9780252085161
Published: 9 Mar 2020
Published In: United States
Imprint: University of Illinois Press
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Format: Paperback
Height: 235mm
Width: 156mm
Pages: 304

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