CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2025
| Author | Salgam Poyraz, Didem |
|---|---|
| Title | Pre-Marital Sexting and Sexuality Norms in Turkey: Sex(t)ual Subjectivity and Agency |
| Summary | This dissertation explores how offline norms regulating sexual practices and sexing shape and are shaped by each other in contemporary Turkey by inquiring about the contrasting tensions of women’s sex(t)ual subjectivities, Islamic religiosity, and the use of Turkish obscene language in sexting. At the same time, I analyze the subjectivities and agencies of the individuals I study. The discussion in this dissertation is empirically informed by (1) a set of in-depth interviews with 13 women and 11 men who are self-identified heterosexual, educated, urbanite young adults who have experience of sexting and who live in Ankara, Turkey, and (2) critical analysis of online discussions about sexting on online Turkish community, namely Kızlar Soruyor (Girls are Asking). Building upon the international scholarship on sexting in particular, and cybersex in general, I argue that sexting is not disassociated from offline norms. On the contrary, I claim that offline norms such as religion, national politics, socio-cultural codes, and feminist movements have a significant impact on how my research participants practice sexting: what kind of language they use, what kind of images they share, with whom they sext, whether and how they speak up for their sex(t)ual desires, and how they feel about it. Following poststructuralist feminist theories, I argue that my women research participants present multiple, unfixed, and changing sex(t)ual subjectivities in their sexting practices. Depending on how they are impacted by national politics, cultural codes of sexuality, and their feminist values, they consciously or not make certain preferences in their sexting practices and manifest diverse forms of agencies. The desire of my pious Muslim informants to protect their Islamic faith and to remain a good Muslim subject while exploring their sexual desires and engaging in sexting leads them to play around with Islamic norms and develop strategies. Significantly, they do not leave their Islamic selves behind while engaging in sexting practices. On the contrary, I argue that they maintain their pious subjectivities by utilizing the digitally mediated materiality of sexting. In this sense, they are often caught between their sexual desires and Islamic values. Lastly, contrary to the commonly accepted (feminist) idea that Turkish obscene language sexually objectifies women, the individuals I study – some of whom are self-identified feminists – sexually enjoy using this language in sexting, although they disapprove of its use in daily communication. I claim that their conscious use of this language, despite its negative and sexist connotations, highlights their socio-culturally and historically specific agencies. I also argue that through using this language, the women I study come into being as sexually desiring and desirable subjects instead of sexual objects. This dissertation contributes to the international scholarship on sexuality and sexting by highlighting the significance of subjectivity and agency in analyzing and understanding my research participants’ sexting practices in a non-western, religiously conservative, and authoritarian context. It highlights the various modalities of agencies that cannot be grasped and explained through the binary category of resistance and submission. |
| Supervisor | Renkin, Hadley |
| Department | Gender Studies PhD |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2025/salgam_didem.pdf |
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