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book: Mostly Straight
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Mostly Straight

Sexual Fluidity among Men
Language: English
Published/Copyright: 2017

About this book

Most of us assume that sexuality is fixed: either you’re straight, gay, or bisexual. Yet an increasing number of young men today say that those categories are too rigid. They are, they insist, “mostly straight.” They’re straight, but they feel a slight but enduring romantic or sexual desire for men. To the uninitiated, this may not make sense. How can a man be “mostly” straight? Ritch Savin-Williams introduces us to this new world by bringing us the stories of young men who consider themselves to be mostly straight or sexually fluid. By hearing about their lives, we discover a radically new way of understanding sexual and romantic development that upends what we thought we knew about men.

Today there are more mostly straight young men than there are gay and bisexual young men combined. Based on cutting-edge research, Savin-Williams explores the personal stories of forty young men to help us understand the biological and psychological factors that led them to become mostly straight and the cultural forces that are loosening the sexual bind that many boys and young men experience. These young men tell us how their lives have been influenced by their “drop of gayness,” from their earliest sexual memories and crushes to their sexual behavior as teenagers and their relationships as young adults. Mostly Straight shows us how these young men are forging a new personal identity that confounds both traditional ideas and conventional scientific opinion.

Reviews

An illuminating new study about male sexual fluidity…Calling for a more modern understanding of sexual orientation, [Savin-Williams’s] idea is that increasing numbers of millennial metrosexual young men are shunning rigid notions of sexuality, and increasingly not identifying as straight, but mostly straight. These are not closeted gay or bisexual men but a new generation of guys who are predominantly heterosexual but have embraced the idea that sexuality exists on a spectrum and who have less anxiety than previous generations about being open to intimacy with other guys.
-- Uli Lenart Attitude

Savin-Williams, a highly respected psychologist and pioneer in research on sexual minority youth, brings us a fascinating and in-depth exploration of nonexclusive heterosexuality among young men. Woven around engaging first person narratives that defy gender stereotypes, and supported by emerging science on male sexual fluidity, Mostly Straight offers an opportunity to challenge the status quo of tripartite sexual identities and attractions—bi, gay, straight—and consider the possibility of a more flexible, and less categorical, sexuality.
-- Meredith Chivers, Associate Professor of Psychology and Director of the Sexuality and Gender Laboratory (SageLab), Queen’s University

This is a book whose time has come, and there is no one better suited to tell these riveting, surprising stories than Ritch Savin-Williams. For too long, men who consider themselves ‘mostly straight’ have been invisible and misunderstood. Their experiences will challenge your assumptions about sexual identity and orientation and reveal blind spots in your thinking that you didn’t know you had.
-- Lisa Diamond, author of Sexual Fluidity

In this beautifully written book, Savin-Williams offers a nuanced and substantive portrait of an often overlooked group. He makes a forceful case that both the general public and the scientific community should recognize the existence and experiences of mostly straight men.
-- Letitia Anne Peplau, University of California, Los Angeles

Topics

  • Publicly Available

    Frontmatter

    i
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    Contents

    v
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    Preface

    vii
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    The Sexual Neverlands

    1
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    Straight But Not Narrow

    7
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    Dillon

    11
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    Sexual And Romantic Spectrums

    22
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    Romantic Orientation

    25
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    Sexual And Romantic Fluidity

    28
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    It Is Who I Am

    31
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    Straight, But Not Totally Straight

    34
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    Demetri

    46
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    Ricky

    56
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    Chris

    66
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    Progressive Mostly Straight

    72
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    It’S About The Sex

    77
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    Five Young Men

    80
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    Ryan

    91
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    Kyle

    103
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    It’S About The Romance

    113
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    Two Romantic Young Men

    116
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    Jay

    123
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    It’S About The Sex And The Romance

    129
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    Joel

    138
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    Chandler

    147
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    Do Mostly Straight Youth Exist?

    156
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    Dillon Returns

    166
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    Developmental Trajectories

    177
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    If You Believe You Are Mostly Straight

    191
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    Escaping The Sexual Neverlands

    204
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    Appendix A: Methods

    209
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    Appendix B: Mostly Straight Science

    213
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    Notes

    223
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    Acknowledgments

    229
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    Index

    231
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Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
November 5, 2018
eBook ISBN:
9780674981034
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
View content
https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674981034
eBook ISBN: 9780674981034
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