The enthralment of neuroscience

摘要

Naomi Wolf's Vagina: A New Biography opens with the author's experiences of a waning intensity of orgasm, and subsequent operation on her pelvic nerve. Wolf then explores how this nerve might affect not just orgasm but a wider sense of wellbeing and creativity. Ranging over scientific research, literary texts, and healing therapies, Wolf argues that sexually intimidating behaviour towards women, as well as bad sex, inhibit the chemicals (she singles out dopamine) that trigger pleasure and relaxation, profoundly affecting the complex neurogenital network that is our sexual apparatus.Plenty of commentators have criticised Wolf's simplifications. One neurotransmitter rarely has one effect, and while stress can affect the function of the vagina, it can also affect any other organ. Why, then, Wolf's uncritical focus on the supposed neuroscience of the vagina? Wolf aims, I think, to address wider questions about female sexuality. She notes the semantic confusion in general discourse over female genitalia and underlines the silence and shame that exists in some arenas around both female genitalia and female sexual agency. Her aim throughout is to underscore that misogyny, aggression, and violence can have profound effects: on the body, on the mind, on feelings of entitlement to pleasure.