The Asexual Perspective: Intimacy Without the Intimate

Abstract

Human relations and experiences are limited when dominant social orders are enforced through state intervention, heteronormative practices and assumptions, and ideologies that rest on the understanding that there is a right way to have sex. In this paper, queer theory frameworks and discourse are reworked to include readings of asexuality and asexual perspectives that challenge heteronormativity and state institutions of relations. The idea that without sex, relationships cannot be intimate is challenged. Heteronormative ideologies around sex are considered, including what would happen if sex and physical intimacy were less prominent in creating relations This is achieved by incorporating an asexual perspective as a key concept in queer theory. This is concluded through interactions with queer literature surrounding dominant ideologies and critiques of singledom, sexual reproductivity, and kin-making. The introduction of an asexual perspective to queer theory frameworks can expand critiques of heteronormativity to consider the purpose of sexual intimacy in relations