TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2010//
TI  - ‘‘Living Like a King’’: Conspicuous Consumption, Virtual Communities, and the Social Construction of Paid Sexual Encounters by U.S. Sex Tourists
JO  - Men and masculinities
A1  - Katsulis, Yasmina
SP  - 210
EP  - 230
VL  - 13
IS  - 2
N2  - Paid sex encounters are not simply about having sex, they are cultural acts informed by a complex sexual subjectivity at a particular historical moment and location. Sex tourism, as a practice of conspicuous consumption, enables the cultivation, and experience, of a particular form of subjectivity that relies upon (and exploits) historical differences in power and privilege. In this article, I discuss three interrelated discursive themes: sexual desire for Latinas as the sexual ‘‘Other,’’ a comparative lack of desire for U.S. women, and the use of consumer products (e.g., Viagra) and the cultivation of sexual techniques, as a way to create, experience, and maintain a positive sexual self. By participating in a virtual community dedicated to their interest in sex tourism, customers are able to create a complex, gendered subjectivity that is continually reimagined and reinscribed, as well as construct a set of shared meanings related to paid encounters.<p /> 
LA  - 
SN  - 1097-184X
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1097184X09346813
ID  - ref1
ER  -