Julie Berebitsky, “Sex and the Office: A History of Gender, Power and Desire” (Yale University Press, 2012)

Julie Berebitsky, “Sex and the Office: A History of Gender, Power and Desire” (Yale University Press, 2012)

How to research the history of sexual harassment in the office, when the term sexual harassment was only invented in 1975 and it was long tabou to even use the word sex in conversation? Using an array of rich sources — from Treasury Department archives to trial records, congressional investigation files to films and novels, popular weeklies and dailies to postcards, advertisements to confession magazines, private papers to employment advice guides — Julie Berebitsky takes the reader on a discovery of sexuality in the white collar-office from the Civil War to the present day. Sex and the Office: A History of Gender, Power and Desire (Yale University Press, 2012) analyzes sexual relations, non-consensual and consensual, among co-workers, arguing that the 19th-century ideal of the passionless woman gave way by World War One to an ideal of feminine attractiveness, one that was later transformed by Helen Gurley Brown in the 1960s into a professional strategy for its time. At the same time, feminist groups and the secretarial labor movement coalesced to fight back against decades of discrimination and sexual violence in the office against women workers. Berebitsky concludes her book with an analysis of the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas case, which brought the issue of sexual harassment into the living rooms of Americans. This case, and the Monica Lewinsky-Bill Clinton affair, demonstrate that there is both continuity and change in American attitudes towards sex at the office. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Juliane Maxwald, "Psychoanalytic Sex Therapy: Exploring the Unconscious Life of Sexuality" (Taylor & Francis, 2025)

Juliane Maxwald, "Psychoanalytic Sex Therapy: Exploring the Unconscious Life of Sexuality" (Taylor & Francis, 2025)

Today I spoke with Juliane Maxwald abut her new book Psychoanalytic Sex Therapy: Exploring the Unconscious Life of Sexuality (Taylor & Francis, 2025). Maxwald bridges psychoanalytic theory with cont...

21 Jan 50min

Elwin Hofman et al. eds., "The Business of Pleasure: A History of Paid Sex in the Heart of Europe" (Leuven UP, 2022)

Elwin Hofman et al. eds., "The Business of Pleasure: A History of Paid Sex in the Heart of Europe" (Leuven UP, 2022)

Elwin Hofman joins Jana Byars to talk about the volume he edited with Magaly Rodríguez García & Pieter Vanhees, The Business of Pleasure: A History of Paid Sex in the Heart of Europe (Leuven UP, 2022)...

17 Jan 50min

Everything Is Fine, I'll Just Work Harder: Confessions of a Former Badass

Everything Is Fine, I'll Just Work Harder: Confessions of a Former Badass

In Everything Is Fine, I’ll Just Work Harder: Confessions of A Former Badass (Street Noise Books, 2025), Professor Cara Gormally draws us into the familiar academic world of chronic busyness. In pan...

16 Jan 39min

Zoë McGee, "Courting Disaster: Reading Between the Lines of the Regency Novel" (Manchester UP, 2025)

Zoë McGee, "Courting Disaster: Reading Between the Lines of the Regency Novel" (Manchester UP, 2025)

What do #MeToo and Jane Austen have in common? More than you might think. Ever since the novel was invented, women have used it as a platform for sharing ideas about sexual consent. Dr Zoë McGee reve...

15 Jan 1h 3min

Sam Fullerton, "Sexual Politics in Revolutionary England" (Manchester UP, 2026)

Sam Fullerton, "Sexual Politics in Revolutionary England" (Manchester UP, 2026)

Samuel Fullerton joins Jana Byars to talk about Sexual Politics in Revolutionary England (Manchester UP 2024) to celebrate its paperback release. It recounts a dramatic transformation in English sexua...

15 Jan 53min

Everything Is Fine, I'll Just Work Harder: Confessions of a Former Badass

Everything Is Fine, I'll Just Work Harder: Confessions of a Former Badass

In Everything Is Fine, I’ll Just Work Harder: Confessions of A Former Badass (Street Noise Books, 2025), Professor Cara Gormally draws us into the familiar academic world of chronic busyness. In pan...

15 Jan 39min

Julia H. Meszaros, "Economies of Gender: Masculinity, "Mail Order Brides," and Women’s Labor" (Rutgers UP, 2025)

Julia H. Meszaros, "Economies of Gender: Masculinity, "Mail Order Brides," and Women’s Labor" (Rutgers UP, 2025)

Economies of Gender: Masculinity, "Mail Order Brides," and Women's Labor (Rutgers University Press, 2025) by Dr. Julia Meszaros offers a provocative exploration of the international dating industry, c...

12 Jan 40min

Heather Smith-Cannoy et al., "Sex Trafficking and Human Rights: The Status of Women and State Responses" (Georgetown UP, 2022)

Heather Smith-Cannoy et al., "Sex Trafficking and Human Rights: The Status of Women and State Responses" (Georgetown UP, 2022)

Human trafficking for the sex trade is a form of modern-day slavery that ensnares thousands of victims each year, disproportionately affecting women and girls. While the international community has de...

11 Jan 58min

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