ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the ways in which sex and sexuality are currently constructed and contested within one particular medium: sex advice books. Sex advice books are part of the wider genre of self-help books, which focus, for example, upon confidence and assertiveness, planning a career, dieting or various other ways to become 'a new, improved you'. Sex advice books can be located within the wider arena of sexology and sex therapy, drawing on sexological classifications, research and therapeutic techniques. In order to construct sex and intimacy as a problem to be solved, books assume: The sexual imperative: that 'healthy' individuals and relationships must be sexual; Relationship normativity: that a 'relationship' means long-term heteromonogamous coupledom; the coital imperative: that 'sex' means the normative sexual script of 'foreplay' followed by penis-in-vagina (PIV) intercourse leading to orgasm. The coital imperative – that 'sex' means PIV intercourse leading to orgasm – is constructed through the structure and content of the books.
