Yeats once wrote, there are “only two topics [that] can be of the least interest to a serious and studious mood – sex and the dead.” While Talk About Sex foregoes any discussion of death, it explores sex from myriad angles and from a wide array of disciplines including philosophy, psychology, political science, women’s studies, literature, and social work.

Included are discussions ranging from sexual classification—about sexual orientation, gender, and sexual desires—to the ways in which sex, love and relationships are connected. Talk About Sex also ponders the extent to which technology has had an impact on sex and considers whether this impact has been positive or negative and asks questions about various aspects of sexual activities. Can commercial sex ever be non-exploitative? What does transsexualism tell us about gender identity and authenticity?

Robert Scott Stewart is a Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Cape Breton University. He has published widely in applied philosophy and philosophy and literature. With Laurie Shrage, he is currently writing a text, Philosophizing About Sex (Broadview Press forthcoming). For four months in the fall of 2008, he taught for Semester at Sea, a program sponsored by the University of Virginia, which teaches over 700 university students per voyage while sailing round the world. During the trip, he ate more buffet-style cafeteria meals aboard ship than he cares to remember, but he also got to sample some wonderful food in eleven different countries and take a few cooking classes along the way.

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