Kinky Sex Makes the World Go Round: An Unabashed Introduction to BDSM

Introducing ideas of consensual power exchange and role play, Eli explains Bondage & Discipline, Dominance & Submission, and Sadism & Masochism, and how “kinksters” use gender, intense stimulation, and hierarchical power display/enforcement to “play” with erotic interactions like impact, restraint, and verbal direction.

Additional discussion will include: Facing Your Squick & Getting Over It

Does someone else’s sexual desire just make you cringe? Eli relates how she faced her internalized sexual judgment as a closet prude, reconciled her feminist beliefs with women’s voluntary masochism, and managed colleagues’ assumptions about her personal life in light of her research on polyamory and BDSM. Sheff closes with strategies for dealing with your own squick if someone else’s yum is yucky for you.

Instructor: Dr. Elisabeth “Eli” Sheff is the foremost academic expert on polyamory in the US, and the worldwide expert on polyamorous families with children. An expert witness and Guardian Ad Litem with a background in academic sociology, Dr. Sheff specializes in gender and sexual minority families, kink/BDSM, and issues facing trans* people. She is the CEO and Director of Legal Services at the Sheff Consulting Group, a think-tank of experts specializing in unconventional and underserved populations. Sheff has been interviewed by everyone; The Huffington Post, The Sunday London Times, The Boston Globe, Newsweek, The Atlantic, CNN. She has published extensively and blogs at Psychology Today, How Do I Date?, and at elisabethsheff.com.