Overview

Since the 1970s, historians have claimed that an insatiable 'will to know' has powered the growing concern with male homosexuality across Europe and the West, especially from the late nineteenth century onwards. Unwilling To Know challenges this dominant narrative by demonstrating how, unlike in neighbouring France, Germany, and Britain, a mixture of silence and code surrounded homosexuality in Belgium until well after the Second World War. Whereas over a thousand scientific monographs on homosexuality were published in wider Europe between 1898 and 1908, the lack of publishing in Belgium was combined with a marked lack of interest from the police, psychiatrists and wider society. Through internationally comparative analyses, and with particular reference to the importance of religion, Wannes Dupont complicates overly monolithic views of European developments based on a handful of familiar cases. In doing so, this study lays bare the many national, cultural, institutional, legal and religious differences that have shaped the scrutiny of homosexuality in diverging ways.

Full Product Details

9781009570121

Table of Contents

Reviews

Author Information

Wannes Dupont is a Lecturer in the History of Sexuality at the University of Edinburgh. His research focuses on queer history, reproductive politics, and the intersections of biopolitics and religion. Dupont has previously published articles in journals including the History Workshop Journal and the Journal of the History of Sexuality.

Tab Content 6

Countries Available