Sex and the City of God
February 22, 2007, 1:03 pm
Posted by Cathleen Kaveny
A Conversation about Sex, Catholicism, and Contemporary Culture.
At Notre Dame next Wednesday night.
If you’re around, and not busy, come to the discussion.
We have a very good panel, as the news release shows. One of the great blessings of teaching at Notre Dame is the capacity to assemble an interdisciplinary group of faculty, and very thoughtful students, to address complicated issues at the intersection of ethics, theology and culture.
By the way, for any Domers out there, if you look very closely, you can see a tiny basilica and main building in the center of the skyline!
I suggest that all of the panelists should read Lee Siegel’s incisive essay on “Sex and the City”: “Who is Carrie Bradshaw Really Dating?” in his book Falling Upwards. Siegel contends that Sex in the City is really about commodity fetishism, and that contemporary sexual culture can’t possibly be understood without relating it to the hyper-individualism fostered by consumer capitalism.
The panel’s gender balance is a bit off, is it not?
I guess the TV show’s gender balance is off too! The program is in a way response to the Vagina Monologues controversy on campus last year– which largely was about women — and which made us realize that we needed to provide more ways to help the students integrate their Catholic faith with the world around them, including what’s refracted through pop culture.
Sex and the City seemed an obvious place to start. If the event goes well, we might do an evening around “Entourage” –which appeals more to young men, next year.