Sex, Love and Abuse Discourses on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault

Sex, Love and Abuse intervenes in a timely way on some important issues that have become 'elephants in the room' for academic and policy considerations around sexual violence and abuse. In so doing, this book draws upon a range of literatures and novel empirical sources to encourage critical thinking about the relationship between sex, love and abuse, examining crimes including sexual assault, pornography, child sexual abuse and domestic violence.
 
This provocative book seeks to destabilize essentialist understandings of these phenomena with a view to identifying the subtle and complex nature of relationships, which often defy easy explanation and categorisation. Focusing on theories, public discourses and moral ideals, Hayes connects romantic love, intimacy and harm in a unique philosophical analysis, exploring abuse in relationships and how such abuse is fostered.
 

Sharon Hayes is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Justice at Queensland University of Technology, Australia. Her critical analyses of gender and crime are published in journals such as Sexualities and Critical Criminology, and in previous monographs including Sex, Crime and Morality (2012) and The Politics of Sex Trafficking (Palgrave, 2013).

Foreword; Kerry Carrington
1. Introduction
2. Enchantment and Romance
3. From Disney to Distortion
4. From Distortion to Abuse
5. Sexual Spaces
6. Sexism and Misogyny
7. Sexual Predation and Gendered Norms
8. Conclusion - A Geography of Abuse