IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsoctx/v7y2017i2p11-d97513.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

‘No, My Husband Isn’t Dead, [But] One Has to Re-Invent Sexuality’: Reading Erica Jong for the Future of Aging

Author

Listed:
  • Ieva Stončikaitė

    (Department of English and Linguistics, University of Lleida, Plaça Víctor Siurana, 1, 25003 Lleida, Spain)

Abstract

New biomedicalized forms of longevity, anti-aging ideals, and the focus on successful aging have permeated the current sociocultural and political climate, and will affect the future of aging. This article examines changing attitudes towards sexual practices and the perception of sexuality in later years, as exemplified in Erica Jong’s middle and late life works and interviews. Instead of succumbing to anti-aging culture and biomedicalization of sex in old age, Jong reveals alternative ways of exploring sexual practices in older age, and challenges a pharmaceutical market that promotes the consumption of medication to enhance the idea of virility and ‘sexual fitness’ in older men. Jong’s work undoes the narrative of decline that portrays older individuals as sexually inactive and frail, and, at the same time, shows that the interest in sexual intercourse and the erect phallus gradually becomes less important as people grow older. This qualitative narrative analysis opens the discussion for reconsideration of late-life sexuality beyond biomedical understandings of late-life sex and old age. The study also reveals how a literary approach can provide alterative and more realistic perspectives towards sexual experiences in later stages of life that can have significant implications for healthcare policy and the future of aging.

Suggested Citation

  • Ieva Stončikaitė, 2017. "‘No, My Husband Isn’t Dead, [But] One Has to Re-Invent Sexuality’: Reading Erica Jong for the Future of Aging," Societies, MDPI, vol. 7(2), pages 1-11, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsoctx:v:7:y:2017:i:2:p:11-:d:97513
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/7/2/11/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/7/2/11/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Barbara L. Marshall & Stephen Katz, 2012. "The Embodied Life Course: Post-ageism or the Renaturalization of Gender?," Societies, MDPI, vol. 2(4), pages 1-13, October.
    2. Gott, Merryn & Hinchliff, Sharron, 2003. "How important is sex in later life? The views of older people," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 56(8), pages 1617-1628, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ieva Stončikaitė, 2020. "On the Hunt for Noble Savages: Romance Tourism and Ageing Femininities," Societies, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-10, June.
    2. Jacqueline Low & Claudia Malacrida, 2013. "Embodied Action, Embodied Theory: Understanding the Body in Society," Societies, MDPI, vol. 3(3), pages 1-5, July.
    3. Matthew Lee Smith & Caroline D. Bergeron & Heather H. Goltz & Tammy Coffey & Ali Boolani, 2020. "Sexually Transmitted Infection Knowledge among Older Adults: Psychometrics and Test–Retest Reliability," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(7), pages 1-10, April.
    4. Hordern, Amanda Jane & Street, Annette F., 2007. "Constructions of sexuality and intimacy after cancer: Patient and health professional perspectives," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(8), pages 1704-1718, April.
    5. Speer, Susan A. & Tucker, Samantha R. & McPhillips, Rebecca & Peters, Sarah, 2017. "The clinical communication and information challenges associated with the psychosexual aspects of prostate cancer treatment," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 185(C), pages 17-26.
    6. Bob Erens & Kirstin R Mitchell & Lorna Gibson & Jessica Datta & Ruth Lewis & Nigel Field & Kaye Wellings, 2019. "Health status, sexual activity and satisfaction among older people in Britain: A mixed methods study," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(3), pages 1-20, March.
    7. Ieva Stončikaitė & Núria Mina-Riera, 2020. "A Creative Writing Workshop on Sexuality and Ageing: A Spanish Pilot Case Study," Societies, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-12, July.
    8. Alison Pullen & Torkild Thanem & Melissa Tyler & Louise Wallenberg & Andrew King, 2016. "Queer Categories: Queer(y)ing the Identification ‘Older Lesbian, Gay and/or Bisexual (LGB) Adults’ and its Implications for Organizational Research, Policy and Practice," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(1), pages 7-18, January.
    9. Shuyan Yang & Elsie Yan, 2016. "Demographic and psychosocial correlates of sexual activity in older Chinese people," Journal of Clinical Nursing, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 25(5-6), pages 672-681, March.
    10. Ana Carvalheira & Cynthia Graham & Aleksandar Stulhofer & Bente Traen, 2020. "Predictors and correlates of sexual avoidance among partnered older adults among Norway, Denmark, Belgium, and Portugal," European Journal of Ageing, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 175-184, June.
    11. Hyojung Park & Sunhwa Shin, 2015. "Development and psychometric testing of a semantic differential scale of sexual attitude for the older person," Nursing & Health Sciences, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 17(4), pages 526-532, December.
    12. Ieva Stončikaitė, 2019. "Critical Approaches to Ageing Body Politics in the Works of Erica Jong," Societies, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-10, June.
    13. Félix Neto & Maria da Conceição Pinto, 2013. "The Satisfaction with Sex Life Across the Adult Life Span," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 114(3), pages 767-784, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsoctx:v:7:y:2017:i:2:p:11-:d:97513. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.