The study of the relationship between language and sexuality, an evolution of the study of language and gender, is the focus of this collective volume in which linguists and anthropologists collaborate in an effort to explore various aspects of a minimally studied subject.

Twelve texts organized into four thematic sections highlight the complex indicative relationship between language, gender, and sexuality in various contexts, including well-known sexual identity categorizations without being limited to them. A primary starting point for the authors is the linguistic construction of gender and -given the implicit expectation for heterosexual sexual desire and behavior (heteronormativity)- the indicative relationship between gender and sexuality through language.

The gendered self is linguistically constructed, subsequently referring to sexual subjectivities which, although largely predetermined, become the subject of intense and continuous negotiation and questioning. In the texts, readers will find a variety of approaches to sexuality and the language in which it is expressed.

A significant advantage of this volume is that it covers a wide range of topics -from telephone sex, sex work, and the formation of heterosexual and homosexual identities of women and men, to an obituary that silences the life of a young deceased person from the AIDS virus, the discourse of gay pornography, and 'fans' of pre-operative transsexual women, among others- while avoiding an approach to sexuality as if it were exclusively related to homosexual or non-heterosexual behavior.

In this way, it contributes to the understanding of heterosexuality as (yet another) sexuality, which is necessary in order to realize its normative dynamics - that which makes it the measure by which we are all measured, even when we choose partners of the opposite sex.

[Excerpt from the text on the back cover of the edition]