Pornography  

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Pornography - The Secret History of Civilisation

"One person's erotica is another person's pornography."

[I can't define what is pornography.] "But I know it when I see it." --Potter Stewart, 1964

Pornography sometimes shortened to porn or porno, is the explicit representation of the human body or sexual activity with the goal of sexual arousal.

The word derives from the Greek pornographia, which derives from the Greek words porne ("prostitute"), grapho ("to write or record"), and the suffix ia (meaning "state of", "property of", or "place of"), thus meaning "a place to record prostitutes".

It is similar to, but arguably distinct from erotica, which is the use of sexually arousing imagery used for artistic purposes only. The fact that the terms pornographer, and pornography and weren't attested in the English language (though it had been used by Restif de la Bretonne in his 1769 Le Pornographe) from the 1850s onwards, makes this era a fault line in the history of pornography. Another defining moment was the discovery of the ruins of Pompeii and the subsequent hiding of the erotic art of the Antiquity in the 1740s. Over the past few decades, an immense industry for the production and consumption of pornography has grown, due to emergence of VHS, DVD and the Internet.

As opposed to erotica

In general, "erotica" refers to portrayals of sexually arousing material that hold or aspire to artistic or historical merit, whereas "pornography" often connotes the prurient depiction of sexual acts, with little or no artistic value. The line between "erotica" and the term "pornography" (which is frequently considered a pejorative term) is often highly subjective. In practice, pornography can be defined merely as erotica that certain people perceive as "obscene." The definition of what one considers obscene can differ between persons, cultures and eras. This leaves legal actions by those who oppose pornography open to wide interpretation. It also provides lucrative employment for armies of lawyers, on several "sides."

Media

Pornography may use any of a variety of media — printed literature, photos, sculpture, drawing, painting, animation, sound recording, film, video, or video game. However, when sexual acts are performed for a live audience, by definition it is not pornography, as the term applies to the depiction or reproduction of the act, rather than the act itself.

New media adoption

Cultural historians have suggested that every art medium and publishing medium first was used for pornography: handwriting, painting, sculpture, the printing press, printed sheet music, motion pictures, videotapes, DVDs and the Internet.

This is especially evident in recent history. The videotape and DVD media might have flourished without porn, but they have certainly flourished very well with it: the porn industry produces more titles per year than Hollywood; it even compares to Bollywood.

Curiously, porn plays in few theaters, and in many countries it is difficult to rent porn videos, because movie rental stores such as Blockbuster and other large video-rental firms avoid porn; most distribution is by sale.

Pornography as subversive social commentary

During the Enlightenment, many of the French free-thinkers began to exploit pornography as a medium of social criticism and satire. Libertine pornography was a subversive social commentary and often targeted the Catholic Church and general attitudes of sexual repression. The market for the mass-produced, inexpensive pamphlets soon became the bourgeoisie, making the upper class worry, as in England, that the morals of the lower class and weak-minded would be corrupted since women, slaves and the uneducated were seen as especially vulnerable during that time. The stories and illustrations (sold in the galleries of the Palais Royal, along with services of prostitutes) were often anti-clerical and full of misbehaving priests, monks and nuns, a tradition that in French pornography continued into the 20th century. In the period leading up to the French Revolution, pornography was also used as political commentary; Marie Antoinette was often targeted with fantasies involving orgies, lesbian activities and the paternity of her children, and rumors circulated about the supposed sexual inadequacies of Louis XVI. During and after the Revolution, the famous works of the Marquis de Sade were printed. They were often accompanied by illustrations and served as political commentary for their author.

Etymology

The word derives from the Greek pornographia, which derives from the Greek words porne ("prostitute"), grapho ("to write or record"), and the suffix ia (meaning "state of", "property of", or "place of"), thus meaning "a place to record prostitutes". See also: whore dialogues

The terms pornographer, pornography and porn were not attested before the 1850s in the English language, though it had been used by Restif de la Bretonne in his 1769 Le Pornographe. We will therefore distinguish between avant la lettre and apres la lettre pornography.

History

Erotic art in Pompeii and Herculaneum

Pornography is as old as civilization (and can be found painted on various ancient buildings), but the concept of pornography as understood today did not exist until the Victorian era. Previous to that time, though some sex acts were regulated or stipulated in laws, looking at objects or images depicting them was not. In some cases, specific books, engravings or image collections were censored or outlawed, but the trend to compose laws that restricted viewing of sexually explicit things in general was a Victorian construct. When large scale excavations of Pompeii were undertaken in the 1860s, much of the erotic art of the Romans came to light, shocking the Victorians who saw themselves as the intellectual heirs of the Roman Empire. They did not know what to do with the frank depictions of sexuality, and endeavored to hide them away from everyone but upper class scholars. The moveable objects were locked away in the Secret Museum in Naples, Italy and what could not be removed was covered and cordoned off as to not corrupt the sensibilities of women, children and the working class. Soon after, the world's first law criminalizing pornography was enacted by the Parliament of the United Kingdom in 1857 in the Obscene Publications Act. The Victorian attitude that pornography was for a select few can be seen in the wording of the Hicklin test stemming from a court case in 1868 where it asks, "whether the tendency of the matter charged as obscenity is to deprave and corrupt those whose minds are open to such immoral influences." Despite their suppression, depictions of erotic imagery are common throughout history, and remain so.

Pompeii

A defining moment in the history of pornography was the discovery of the ruins of Pompeii and the subsequent hiding of the erotic art of Pompeii and Herculaneum in the 1740s.

See also

• History of erotic depictions
• Erotica
• Eroticism
• Human sexuality
• Paraphilia
• Pornocracy
• Romance
• Sexual fantasy

References

• The Secret Museum: Pornography in Modern Culture by Walter Kendrick