Bisexual Women, Non-Monogamy and Differentialist Anti-Promiscuity Discourses

C. Klesse

Popular discourses on bisexuality assume a peculiar interrelation between bisexuality and non-monogamy. Drawing upon qualitative research in gay male and bisexual non-monogamies in the UK, this article explores bisexual women's accounts on the effects of promiscuity allegations on non-monogamous sexual and relationship practice. Due to the prominence of gender as a differentializing factor in the discourses on promiscuity, to be publicly known as bisexual and non-monogamous tends to have particularly stigmatizing effects on women. The issue is further complicated by the intersection of promiscuity discourses with discourses on race/ethnicity and class. The regimes of violence that go hand in hand with the stigmatization through promiscuity allegations police women's sexual behaviour making it more risky for women of certain positioning to come out or move and socialize in certain cultural contexts.