I was curious about the etymology of “contract” after remembering that the etymology of “consent” is actually literally “to feel together,” itself a formulation of the Latin “con-” prefix (meaning “with”) and “sentire” (meaning “to feel”). Contract, perhaps unsurprisingly, is much more direct. It is from the Latin “contractus,” which means exactly the same thing […]
Posts Tagged ‘language’
Brief (show)case study: How to include “vanillas” in your BDSM outreach
Clarisse Thorn, a volunteer for the Leather Archives and Museum and a personal inspiration for me, is working on a project I find extremely interesting. She’s trying to collect oral histories of people who enjoy what BDSM’ers would call kinky sex but she’s trying to collect them from people who do not consider themselves part […]
Honor thy language: “kinky†is an adjective, not an activity
Since I was a boy, I have been confronted with the maddening reality of being told to second-guess myself, that due to who I am (a person diagnosed with bipolar disorder) I can’t trust my own thoughts or feelings. Then I grew up and I learned that certain words do not mean to others what […]
