Mundane heterosexualities

de Jennifer Lorna Hockey, Jenny Hockey, Angela Meah, Victoria Robinson

Heterosexuality has been described as an invisible or unmarked category, an aspect of everyday life which for many people is taken-for-granted. Mundane Heterosexualities engages with an important body of feminist theorising around heterosexuality - but argues that the need for empirical data remains pressing if thinking in this area is to develop. Through life course interviews with members of different generations within extended families, it addresses questions of what it means to grow up heterosexual, how the gendered body comes into being, what aspects of a 'heterosexual imaginary' individuals draw on when anticipating adult heterosexuality, and what they perceive as their heterosexual 'successes' and 'failures'. The authors argue that heterosexuality transcends the simply sexual, instead shaping our gender identities and patterning our lives during both their mundane and extreme periods.