Most of us are familiar with the phrase “sex sells,” but rarely do we apply it when shopping for WesMaps courses. In the class “Bad Sex,” Professor of Sociology Greg Goldberg explores cultural perspectives on sex, sexuality, and desire from psychological and sociological perspectives.

“My impression from students is that Wesleyan is an intense environment, in terms of thinking about, talking about, and having (or not having) sex,” Goldberg wrote in an email to The Argus. “Many of the students I’ve talked to about the class have expressed a strong desire to address the subject from a rigorous, academic perspective.”

The course explores the topic through the lens of psychoanalytic thought, but it also includes texts that pointedly address social relations as they relate to gender and race. However, the bulk of the syllabus revolved around the work of Adam Phillips, a British psychotherapist and essayist.

“[Phillips] is at the heart of the class,” Chiara Bercu ’19, a current member, said. “The way that we talk about sex, quote ‘bad’ desire, like wanting bad things, the policing of desire, the policing of sex, we talk about all of that through the lens of psychoanalysis.”

Goldberg noted that the risqué nature of the title was intentionally eye-catching, but not exactly what students would necessarily expect.

“The course title is intentionally salacious (good advertising!), but in truth the course is less an empirical exploration of sex—people’s desires, practices, experiences and so on—than a theory-driven interrogation of widespread, culturally-informed anxieties about sex and sexuality,” Goldberg wrote.

Bercu elaborated on this, agreeing that the class’ content is a little different than its title.

“It’s at once a thing that almost everyone has something to say about and feels accessible, but then also weird considering it through a psychoanalytic lens and through queer theory,” she explained. “So in that sense, it’s not maybe what some people would expect.”

Despite this, the course structure has been successful, as many students have raved about the curriculum and the stimulating class discussions.

“In sociology we tend to all hold the agreement that social relations are what trickle down to personal relations, which is true, but what Goldberg basically theorizes is that it might be interesting to think how interpersonal relations trickle up,” Simone Silvan ’21 explained. “To that end, it’s not provocative because you’re forced to disagree or that you want to disagree, but it’s provocative because it taps into a new place in the psyche which is psychoanalysis. We think about psychoanalyzing all of our behaviors and all of our actions and thoughts but we never think about psychoanalyzing our social beliefs and that has been pretty transformational for me.”

“The class discussions, I mean, this one’s different, but they are very textual,” Bercu added. “So whoever we read that day, we’ll consider what the stakes are in their argument. What it is that they care about, what it is that they’re afraid of. Or like, [what] they’re aiming to protect. What it is that they dread.”

In addition to designing and teaching this course, Goldberg is also working on a book that pertains to certain issues addressed in the curriculum. The common thread in all of Goldberg’s work is a fascination with the nature of human interaction, in many different facets of life. Goldberg is also interested in finding out more about “media and mediation” and how media can function as a barrier between people.

“I’m interested in norms surrounding social and interpersonal relations, i.e. how we’re supposed to be with other people,” Goldberg said. “[I’m] more interested in our fascination with people’s sexual desires and practices than [he] is in these desires and practices themselves.”

Goldberg is also teaching the same course in the fall, along with Introductory Sociology. As a lasting thought, Goldberg posed a question that he and his students frequently ponder:

“What if we tried to understand sex and sexuality less, rather than more?”

Stella Ginsberg can be reached at sginsberg@wesleyan.edu.