In Economic-Philosophical Manuscripts, Karl Marx (a product of
the civilization of literacy) addressed alienation: "We thus
arrive at the result that man feels that he acts freely only in
his animal functions-eating, drinking, procreation, or at most
using shelter, jewelry, etc.-while in his human functions, he
feels only animal. What is animal becomes human and what is
human becomes animal." How an analysis of industrial capitalism,
with its underlying pragmatic structure reflected in literacy,
can anticipate phenomena pertinent to the post-industrial, and
reflected in illiteracy, is not easy to explain.
Although he referred to economic self-constitution, his
description is significant in more than one way. Sexuality is of
concern in the civilization of illiteracy insofar as the human
being in its multi-dimensionality is of concern. This might sound
too broad to afford any meaningful inference from the condition
of literacy to the condition of human sexuality, but it is an
existential premise. Through sexuality humans project their
natural condition and the many influences, language included,
leading to its humanization. An understanding of the multiple
factors at work in conditioning human experiences as intimate as
sexual relations, depends upon the understanding of the pragmatic
framework in which they unfold. Child pornography on the Internet
is by no means the offspring of our love affair with technology.
Neither is pornography being invoked for the first time as a
justification for censorship. Nevertheless, the commotion
regarding the Communications Decency Act constitutes a new
experience that is intimately related to the condition of human
existence in today's world.
"SWF seeks unemployed SWM grad student for hideaway weekends,
intimate dinners, and cuddling. Must know how to read, and be
able to converse without extensive use of 'you know' or
'wicked.'" This announcement (dated October 6, 1983) is one
among many that use qualifying initials, but with one twist:
"Must know how to read."-moreover, to be articulate. What over
ten years ago was formulated innocently (hideaway, intimate
dinner, cuddling) would today be expressed quite bluntly:
"Looking for good sex." What does reading, and possibly writing,
have to do with our emotional life, with our need and desire to
love and be loved; that is, what does reading have to do with
sex?
Long before Homo Sapiens ascertained itself, reproduction, and
all it comprises in its natural and form, ensured survival. Do
literacy, language, or sign systems affect this basic equation of
life? Mating seasons and habits shed some light on the natural
aspect. Colors, odors, mating calls, specific movements (dances,
fights, body language) send sexual signals. Molecular biology
places the distinction between hominids and chimpanzees at four
million years ago. After all this time of freeing themselves
from nature, even to the extent of self-constitution in the
practical experience of artificial insemination, human beings
still integrate color, odor, mating calls, and particular
movements into the erotic. But they also integrate the experience
of their self-constitution in language. Since the time hominids
distinguished themselves, the sexuality of the species started
differentiating itself from that of animals. For example,
humans are permanently attractive, even after insemination,
while animals attract each other only at moments favorable
for reproduction. Along the timeline from the primitive being
to our civilization, sex changed from being an experience in
reproduction to being predominantly a form of pleasure in itself.
Instead of the immediacy of the sexual urge, projected through
patterns subject to natural cycles, humans experience ever more
mediated forms of sexual attraction and gratification, which are
not necessarily associated with reproduction. An initial change
occurred when humanized sexual drive turned into love, and
became associated with its many emotions. The practical
experience of language played an important part in extending
sexual encounters from the exclusive realm of nature to the
realm of culture. Here they acquired a life of their own through
practical experiences characteristic of the syncretic phase of
human practical experiences, mostly rituals. During the process
of differentiating these experiences-constitution of myths, moral
and ethical self-awareness, theater, dance, poetry-sexual
encounters were subjected to various interpretations.