Differences of Gender and Medicalization of Sexuality in the Creation of Sexual Dysfunctions Diagnosis

Abstract

The article aims to analyze critically the most important and updated contributions focused on the recent stage of the medicalization of sexuality. Most works center on the production of the category and the diagnosis of “sexual dysfunction”, considering either the masculine case (more largely studied via “erectile dysfunction”), or the feminine case (in many cases translated into the idea of a supposed complexity of women’s sexuality). The perspective I utilize has as a reference the social studies of science and, in particular, the contributions of anthropology and history of medicine. In addition, it incorporates the matrix of the gender and science studies that have produced a powerful critical view of the scientific production of the two last centuries, revealing how the gender conditioners have crossed the relation between knowledge production and social context.