Human Sexuality : Discourse, Theories, Studies and Practices

The purpose of this monograph is, firstly, to present and examine the historical development of the discourse, theories and key studies that have been done on sexuality since the late Middle Age (fourteenth century); secondly, the purpose is to present and analyze the development of human sexual practice, from infancy to adulthood, based on accumulated knowledge, from the debut of the first scientific studies on sexuality (nineteenth century) to today. This monograph is divided into two parts: The first part presents successively the historical development of discourse on sexuality in Western societies and in other societies worldwide (Chapter I); the historical development of theories on sexuality (Chapter II); and the historical development of the key scientific studies that have been done on sexuality (Chapter III). The second part presents the development of sexual practice, in humans, since childhood (Chapter IV) to adolescence and adulthood (Chapter V). In this part, we also describe the homosexual sexual practice in modern societies and in other traditional societies such as pre-colonial South Pacific, pre-colonial African, and pre-Colombian American societies (Chapter VI).