Race and Masculinity in Gay Men’s Pornography: Deconstructing the Big Black Beast
ISBN: 9781003023517
Platform/Publisher: Taylor & Francis / Routledge
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Unlimited; Download: Unlimited



This book unpacks the character of pornographic representations of queer Black masculinity and how these representations vary between corporate and noncorporate producers. The author argues that representations of Black men in gay porn rely on stereotypes of Black masculinity to arouse consumers, especially those which characterize Black men as "missing links" or focus excessively on their "dark phalluses." Moreover, these depictions consistently separate gay Black and white men's sexuality into bifurcated discursive spaces, thereby essentializing sexual aspects of racial identity. Lastly, though such depictions are less prevalent in user-submitted videos, overall, both user-submitted and corporate content reify stereotypes about Black masculinity.

This book is written for researchers, lecturers, and graduate courses in the social sciences and humanities, including Sociology, Social Psychology, Sexuality, African American Studies, Women and Gender Studies, LGBTQ Studies, Culture and Art Studies, Porn Studies, Social Media Studies, and Public Health.


Desmond Francis Goss earned a BA in Psychology, an MA in Public Sociology, and a PhD in Sociology from Georgia State University in 2017, where he is now a Lecturer and Founding Director of the Social Justice Certificate Program. He is a theory-driven qualitative scholar, whose research and teaching involves critical analyses of identity, lived experience, and power, at the intersection of race, gender, and sexuality. His work is published in the edited volumes Sex Matters (2018) and Focus on Social Problems (2016/2017).

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