"There's No Teleology to It; It's Just about the Spirit of Play": Men, Intimacy, and "Late" Modernity

Abstract

The certainties that characterized modern intimate life, and supported a hegemonic male sexuality defined by action and virility, are less present in contemporary men's intimate lives. In-depth interviews with ten heterosexual and gay men were conducted to explore how they organize their sexual and relational lives in contemporary Australia. Participants were committed to a "late" modern notion of intimacy characterized by reciprocity, and placed emphasis on committed relationships where opportunities to disclose vulnerability and relinquish the burden of responsibility for sexual activity were present. However, casual sex appeared to be ordered by more conventional discourses related to male sexuality. These men reveal the importance of particular definitions of sexual intimacy to a meaningful sense of self in late modernity.