‘Some people live out their own snuff movie’: Knowledge, ‘safer’ sex and managing desire in the city

In the complex interweaving of sexual identities, social roles, erotic practices and fantasies, there are a number of competing discourses that surround different 'truths' of sex. Following Foucault's History of Sexuality this paper explores two of these truths, scientific knowledge of sex (Scientia sexualis) and desire grounded in the personal experience (Ars erotica). These are linked with the notion of the self-monitoring individual actor who is both an agent of his own desire, but also has been recruited into a health surveillance role of 'active patient'. Drawing on analyses from a recent study on male sexualities and genitourinary clinics, it is argued that many contemporary sexual identities are constructed through urban discourses and notions of metropolitan sexualities and forms of consumption. The city is a Leitmotif for freedom and diversity, while also the arena for management of sexual careers and identities. However, it continues to draw on metaphors of purity, contamination and danger that have characterized urban imagination.