Paraphilias and the construction of normative sexuality; a Foucauldian analysis of psychodiagnostic manuals.
Summary
A discursive analysis of powers and knowledges in the Foucauldian sense is used to answer the question in what way psychiatric diagnostic manuals and psychopathological diagnoses are part of the construction of normative sexuality. This analysis focuses on the powers and knowledges involved in the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) diagnoses of paraphilias (unususal sexual behaviours). It shows the heterogenous ways in which these diagnoses, and the responses to them, play a role in the construction of normative sexuality: by means of Othering, opposing, appropriating and the creation of knowledges. The goal of this analysis is to show the ways in which the scientific study of sexuality creates sexuality, rather than observes it.