| Summary: | Recent literature on the history of sexuality in America both confirms and complicates the interpretive framework set out in Intimate Matters twenty-five years ago. New studies reveal the ways reproduction has been highly structured by race and class. Attention to racial difference and race relations has moved from a dichotomous black and white model to multi-cultural explorations. Studies of marriage law, the construction of womanhood, the use of sexual violence, and other topics all demonstrate close connections between sexuality and racial hierarchy. Work on same-sex relations has moved beyond the largest cities and has found a variety of ways in which same-sex love has expressed itself and been understood. Increasing scholarly attention, finally, has focused on the role of the state in defining and policing the boundaries of normalcy.
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