Flirting with Danger: Young Women’s Reflections on Sexuality and Domination

How do women develop their perceptions of sex, love and domination? Why do they express feminist views condemning male violence in the abstract, but often adamantly refuse to name their own violent and exploitative encounters as abuse, rape or victimization? Based on detailed individual and collective interviews with a racially and culturally diverse sample of college-aged American women, this is an exploration of how young women make sense of, resist and negotiate conflicting cultural messages about sexual agency, responsibility, aggression and desire. It seeks to shed light on the cultural lenses through which young women interpret their sexual encounters and their experiences of male aggression in heterosexual relationships.