Abstract
In Sensational Flesh Amber Musser uses the concept of masochism as a theory for black oppression and how black bodies interact with society. Musser defines masochism ‘not as a diagnostic space but as an exceptional practice linked to subversive politics’ (p. 3). However, throughout the book she cautions against always aligning masochism with subversion. Through psychoanalysis, art critique, and queer theory, Musser illustrates both the political and analytic frame that masochism can occupy in relation to black embodiment.
One of Musser’s most salient points is how black female sexuality is often a site of struggle and either/or. Either black women are fetishized, or they are rendered invisible. Musser uses the examples of Venus in Furs and Story of O to illustrate how black women are serving in the background, lacking agency. This point is further explored in the final chapter with the example of Mollena Williams, a black BDSM practitioner who partakes in race play, which is play that ‘revolves around historical racially charged situations’ (p.173). In this example Williams’ blackness is fetishized. Through these examples Musser argues that agency is often limited or dictated by a white patriarchal society. She explores this point later in chapter five examining chronic illness and pain.
In chapter five Musser compares Audre Lorde’s Cancer Journals to the performance art of Bob Flannagan to explain that for black women, sensation and experience are often not individual, but communal and political. Lorde’s Cancer Journals details the pain and alienation she experienced while undergoing treatment for breast cancer, whereas Flannagan’s performance art uses masochism as a means to gain control of the pain Flannagan experienced living with cystic fibrosis. While Flannagan’s masochism is a showcase of him claiming agency over his chronic illness, Lorde’s experience with cancer is one of seeking identity when she is rendered invisible yet again. In short, because Flannagan is a white man, he is able to reclaim his pain, something that Lorde as a black woman is not afforded so easily.
These comparisons are powerful and one of the strengths of Musser’s book. The comparison between Williams and Flannagan further emphasizes that pleasure and sexuality do not exist in a vacuum separate from society, but rather that the very fabric of society often dictates what one can access in terms of agency and subversion.
One of the weaknesses of Sensational Flesh is the link between theoretical masochism and the actual practice of masochism within a kink context. The book mostly addresses how forms of objectification could be theorized as forms of masochism. Musser states the she considers masochism to be ‘a mobile entity whose meanings shift depending on context’ (p. 167). In the context of this book she focused predominantly on the fetishization of black bodies and how power and pain are dictated by white patriarchal standards, and therefore, agency is not in the hands of the black bodies themselves. This is not a book depicting modern understandings of masochism; rather, this is a book that analyzes historical and literary sources for their concept of masochism. Throughout the book Musser uses the work of early sexologists and novels like Venus in Furs as a means to define masochism. Masochism is then analyzed with the use of Williams and Flannagan to further support the point that under a white patriarchal society women and especially black women can only achieve superficial power. In this reading Flannagan’s pain is read more as performance to demonstrate his power as a white man. Sensational Flesh, therefore, is read more as a conceptual framing of certain practices as masochistic, rather than an analysis of how race and masochism are experienced within kink communities. However, there are some discrepancies in some of Musser’s claims in relation to masochism as it relates to the actual practice itself. Musser argues that masochism did not exist prior to sexology and that the pathology is part of what gives masochism its power. In chapter five Musser defines masochism in relation to ‘other psychosexual disorders,’ using Freud and Krafft-Ebing as her main sources, thus aligning masochism with a pathology (p. 123). These definitions date back to the turn of 20th century and are the same mechanisms that previously stated that homosexuality was a sexual deviance. More contemporary and nuanced sources in relation to masochism, such as the work of Peggy Kleinplatz and Charles Moser, would have served Musser better.
From a theoretical perspective, Sensational Flesh adds interesting insight into how marginalization of black female sexuality can be viewed as a form of masochism. The discussions surrounding agency and willful submission as the only means to reclaim power are compelling. Musser’s analysis about how this reclamation only furthers the power of a white patriarchal society raises many questions as to whether subversion is even possible.
