Perversion  

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"Examine these similar actions as we will, we shall find them resulting solely from the spirit of the Perverse. We perpetrate them because we feel that we should not. Beyond or behind this there is no intelligible principle; and we might, indeed, deem this perverseness a direct instigation of the Arch-Fiend, were it not occasionally known to operate in furtherance of good." --"The Imp of the Perverse", Edgar Allan Poe


"Beginning with Manet's Olympia, 1863 (for many the seminal modern picture) and jumping to Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, 1907 (another "breakthough"), and then to the dolls that Hans Bellmer made in the 1930s and the somewhat different looking but equally perverse dolls that appear in Cindy Sherman's Untitled Film Stills, 1979 -- her later grotesquely dismembered dolls are explicitly Bellmeresque, especially when they are composites of fragments that don't add up to a complete body -- and throwing in Egon Schiele's nudes, Balthus's adolescent girls, Piero Manzoni's canned shit, and Gilbert and George's shit cookies (many other works can be mentioned), one realizes that many of the masterpieces of modern art depend on perversion to make their dramatic point." --Donald Kuspit, 2002, "Perversion in Art"

Pervert in the Glossographia (1656)
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Pervert in the Glossographia (1656)
 This page Perversion is part of Psychopathy and psychopathology series. Illustrated by the head of Elagabalus, one of the five "mad emperors" of ancient Rome
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This page Perversion is part of Psychopathy and psychopathology series.
Illustrated by the head of Elagabalus, one of the five "mad emperors" of ancient Rome
 This page Perversion is part of the publication bias list of the Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia, presented by Alfred Jarry.
Enlarge
This page Perversion is part of the publication bias list of the Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia, presented by Alfred Jarry.

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Perversion is a concept describing those types of human behavior that deviate from that which is understood to be orthodox or normal. Although it can refer to a variety of forms of deviation, it is most often used to describe sexual behaviors that are considered particularly abnormal, repulsive or obsessive. Perversion differs from deviant behavior, in that the latter covers areas of behaviour (such as petty crime) for which "perversion" would be too strong a term. It is often considered derogatory and in psychological literature the term paraphilia has been used as a replacement, though this term is controversial, and "deviation" is now used instead by others.

The main connotations of the term are humiliation; debasement, depravity; viciousness, sexual deviance, immorality and even rape.

Contents

Etymology

per-, verto

The word first appeared in the late 14th century with the meaning of deviating from a religious norm. In the sexual sense the word became common in the late 19the century, and works carrying that title include:

It can be found as early as 1876 in Pamphlets on Biology: Kofoid collection.

The verb pervert is less narrow in reference than the related nouns, and may be used with no sexual connotations.

It is used in English law for the crime of perverting the course of justice which is a common law offence.

Modern usage

Modern use of the nouns perversion and pervert reflects their nineteenth-century psychological application, inasmuch as they tend to be used with reference to sexual rather than religious behavior. The first refers to behavior and the second to the person. They are generally derogatory and in psychological literature the term paraphilia is now used instead, (though this term is itself controversial).

The concept of perversion is somewhat subjective, and its application varies depending on culture. As a psychological term it was originally applied especially frequently to homosexual behavior. However, homosexuality is no longer treated as a disorder in mainstream psychiatry.

The verb pervert is less narrow in reference than the related nouns, and is more frequently used with no sexual connotations. One might say, for example, that a modern film version of Romeo and Juliet "perverts" Shakespeare's version of the story.

Catholicism

In a similar sense, the term was also used in the pre-Vatican II era by some Roman Catholics to describe the process of converting from Roman Catholicism to Protestantism. Whereas a Protestant who joined Roman Catholicism was described as a convert, a Catholic who became a Protestant was called a pervert (see Religious conversion). The phrase is no longer used by mainstream Catholicism, though traditional Catholics occasionally still use it.

Slang

In the last sixty years, the term "perv" has taken off as both a noun and verb. The noun is used as an abbreviated version of "sexual pervert", while the verb is used to describe the action of ogling or hitting on someone.

Examples:

  • Noun: "Mikey tried to lure me into his apartment. He is such a perv."
  • Verb: "Yo, you can't just ignore me just because I perved on you a little bit."

See also

Namesakes




Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Perversion" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.

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