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New porn studies journal launched by Middlesex University academic

09/04/2015
The debut issue of the world’s first academic journal dedicated to the critical analysis of pornography has been published.

The debut issue of the world’s first academic journal dedicated to the critical analysis of pornography has been published.

Co-edited by Middlesex University’s Professor Feona Attwood and Professor Clarissa Smith from the University of Sunderland, Porn Studies is a quarterly publication examining all aspects of pornography and the development of research theory, methodology and ethics in the relatively new field of pornography studies.

Commenting on the journal’s first issue, Professor Attwood said: ”This project has been two years in the making, and I am proud to have been able to see it through to fruition.

”Porn Studies is the first international peer-reviewed journal dedicated to pornography. Recognising it as an interdisciplinary field of study will give an outlet to those who wish to examine pornography academically, but beyond the tired old arguments we often see.

”Yes, we know that pornography is at the centre of many major, often controversial debates but Porn Studies  is about more than that. Pornography is about more than that.

”In the issue’s introduction, we reiterate that pornography is increasingly an important topic for academics, the public and policy makers alike. But the debate can be so heated that it is not always conducive to the sharing of research and the development of meaningful dialogue.

”We want this journal to be a publication that enables us to move beyond this and encourage research into a wide array of areas – porn businesses and types of labour, how the distribution and regulation of pornography is changing and more generally its history, modes, aesthetics, genres and subgenres.’

The first issue of Porn Studies includes articles examining the relationship between pornography and sexual imaginaries and issues surrounding young people and sex.

It has been welcomed by leading academics around the world. Professor Gerard Goggin from the University of Sydney said: ”The breadth, depth, and richness of its packed first issue confirms its promise as a platform, not only for understanding pornography - but as a space for new, adventurous, genuinely cosmopolitan rethinking of many of the things about identity, bodies, power, belonging, media, and contemporary reality that we take-for-granted, but still know too little about.”

The first issue is available online until the end of May.

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