« Women Lousy at Designing Clothes for Women? | Home | I'm a Janeite »
December 12, 2005
I'm Getting in on the Slayage
I'm happy to report that my proposal for a paper on "Bad Sex in Buffy" has been accepted for the Slayage Conference 2 to be held at the end of May 2006.
Please read all about my introduction to Buffy, and check out this brief reference to my initial attempts to sketch out some broad ideas about the topic. I want to share, because Buffy is my favorite TV show, and I'm thrilled that I'll be able to spend time researching and thinking about the show, and then get to spend a nice long weekend hanging out with other Buffy-philes.
Here's my abstract for the paper I'll be delivering in May:
‘Sex Is Bad?' ‘We All Knew That': Sex and the Consequences in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.
After Cordelia recovers from being impregnated with demon spawn, she tells Wesley and Angel she's learned that "sex is bad," to which Angel replies, "We all knew that" (A1012). This is not Caleb's simplistic condemnation of sex as dirty and wicked, but an observation about the consequences of sexual activity in the Buffyverse. Much has been written on the sexualized nature of vampirism, and Justine Larbelestier provides a provocative binary of human (or vanilla) vs vampire (or BD/SM) sex in "The Only Thing Better than Killing a Slayer." But given how the range of characters populating the Buffyverse traverse the roles of human/demon, I argue that sex can't be categorized until after it has occurred (unless it involves someone "old" like Giles or Joyce, and then it's "gross"), and no criticism I've read adequately addresses how perilous sex often is in the Buffyverse, not only for Buffy and her demon lovers but for all the Scoobies. Seemingly "safe" sex not only produces dire consequences (supernatural pregnancy, the loss of one's soul, the need to kill one's lover); sexual behavior often attracts danger from outside the relationship, as when Tara is killed by a wayward bullet after she and Willow resume their relationship (Buffy 6019) or when Willow turns into Warren after kissing Kennedy (7013); furthermore, Anya's very presence reminds us that sex is often used to hurt women and women find ways to hurt back. Everything--even birthday parties--can be dangerous on the hell mouth, but sex is especially dangerous. Inhabitants of the Buffyverse constantly negotiate life-or-death issues of vulnerability and power; I examine how they negotiate vulnerability and power with regards to sex, and why these negotiations so often fail--the earth may not be doomed after all, but what about everyone's sex life?
I'll be most grateful for any suggestions and insights anyone wants to offer.
Posted by holly at December 12, 2005 10:00 AM
Leave a comment