The Making of Sexual Health at University
The making of sexual health at university: students, sex, and society in post-war England
This project investigates discourses and experiences of sexual health at English universities in the post-war period. It explores how universities and their students shaped the concept of sexual health and responded to changing sexual cultures and sexual politics across the twentieth and into the twenty-first century. The project revolves around two key questions:
- How has sexual health and its associated practices and discourses been produced and deployed by universities?
- How has sexual health been perceived, adopted, or dismissed by students since the Second World War?
In addition to accessing university archives in the form of student newspapers, welfare guides, student handbooks and SU executive reports, I will also be conducting oral histories of former university students from the 1950s onwards. These interviews will help contextualise the source the material and add depth to the historiographical work on the history of students and the history of sexuality.
Read more about Joseph's project here: 'The HIV/Aids epidemic and the University of Warwick, 1987-1994', Midland History, 49:2 (2024), 225-243.
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