This article focuses on gender relations regarding the use of the male condoms nowadays. It draws both on quantitative data (the FECOND survey, INSERM/INED, 2010) and on interviews with men and women between 20 and 35 who engage in heterosexual intercourse. This article first reports on the gradual spread of the “normalization of condoms” within French society. It then shows that in most cases women are now logistically and “mentally” in charge of the condom. Thus, protection, as well as contraception, is now a feminine responsibility. But gender relations also surface through the use of the condom itself during sexual intercourse (technical-minded masculinity, health-conscious femininity). Hence, this object seems to be a good indicator of the gendered representations of sexuality that still remain, as well as the double injunctions imposed on women.
Abstract
English
Author
Cécile
Thomé
Cite
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