Why read Public City/Public Sex?

Book cover of Public City/Public Sex: Homosexuality, Prostitution, and Urban Culture in Nineteenth-Century Paris

Book description

In the 1800s, urban development efforts modernized Paris and encouraged the creation of brothels, boulevards, cafes, dancehalls, and even public urinals. However, complaints also arose regarding an apparent increase in public sexual activity, and the appearance of "individuals of both sexes with depraved morals" in these spaces. Andrew Israel Ross's…

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European history

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Why read it?

1 author picked Public City/Public Sex as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Holly Grout

Author

Public City/Public Sex offers a provocative foray into the dance halls, brothels, and even the public urinals of nineteenth-century Paris. By centering sexuality conceptually and geographically, Ross advances the novel argument that public sex constituted public culture in the capital city. Vividly illuminating how urban clandestine and public sexual encounters (between men and women, men and men, and to a lesser extent, women and women) necessitated a new form of civic management, Ross cleverly demonstrates the intricate, intimate ways in which sex was implicated in, and developed alongside, the modern city.

From Holly's list on sex and the city in modern France.