Words, Like Viruses, Spill Over. Consider “Porn”

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size AcknowledgementsSpecial thanks to Rylan Higgins for his insightful editing and to Rylan, Jenny Cool, Kanwalbir Sunny Sekhon and Rosina Morelli Walsh for their thoughtful contributions.Notes1. David Quammen, Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic (New York: W. W. Norton, 2012). Expert opinion even divides on the conundrum of whether viruses are alive. If they aren’t, then at the very least they’re mechanistic shortcuts on the principle of life itself.” (p. 263-64). Words are living only metaphorically s people use them.2. Joseph Osmundson, “The Thin Line Between Sickness and Health,” The Atlantic, June 8, 2022. https://www.theatlantic.com/books/archive/2022/06/coronavirus-hiv-illness-books-virology/661198/3. William Safire, “Porn Beyond Sex,” New York Times, November 5, 2002. https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/magazine/05wwln_safire.html4. https://www.oed.com/dictionary/pornography_n5. https://www.oed.com/dictionary/pornography_n6. Philippe Bourgois, In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996).7. Nicholas Kristoff, “The Children of Pornhub,” New York Times, December 4, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/04/opinion/sunday/pornhub-rape-trafficking.html8. Sheelah Kolhatkar, “The Fight to Hold Pornhub Accountable,” New Yorker, June 13, 2022. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/06/20/the-fight-to-hold-pornhub-accountable9. Bernadette Barton, The Pornification of America: How Raunch Culture Is Ruining Our Society (New York: New York University Press, 2021).10. Cecilia Kang, “Three-Quarters of Kids Have Seen Online Pornography by Age 17,” New York Times, January 10, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/10/technology/porn-”-online-report.html?searchResultPosition=1.11. Pornucopia: Going Down in the Valley, 2004, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0437743/.12. A. O. Scott, “”’Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn’ Review: No Sex Please, We’re Romanian,” New York Times, November 18, 2012. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/18/movies/bad-luck-banging-or-loony-porn-review.html13. David Sims, Sophie Gilbert, and Lenika Cruz, “Mad Men: A Toast to Light Beer and Octopus Porn,” The Atlantic, May 4, 2015. https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/05/mad-men-recap-lost-horizon/392291/14. Molly Fitzpatrick, “Did You Catch the Return of Peggy’s Octopus in the ‘Mad Men’ Finale?” Splinter, May 19, 2015. https://splinternews.com/did-you-catch-the-return-of-peggys-octopus-in-the-mad-m-179384783715. Marco Benoit Carbone, “Beauty and the Octopus: Close Encounters with the Other-than-Human,” Jon Hackett; Seán Harrington (eds.). Beasts of the Deep. Sea Creatures and Popular Cultures. Barnet, Herts: John Libbey, 2018. Chapter 4, pp. 59–76, https://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/2004316. “17 Things Stella Young Wanted You to Know,” Australian ABC Net News Ramp Up, December 8, 2014. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-12-08/17-things-stella-young-wanted-you-to-know/5950814.17. Stella Young, “I’m Not Your Inspiration, Thank You Very Much,” TEDxSydney, 2014, https://www.ted.com/talks/stella_young_i_m_not_your_inspiration_thank_you_very_much?language=en18. Gwen Knapp, “‘Inspiration Porn’: Paralympians Know It When They See It,” New York Times, September 5, 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/05/sports/olympics/inspiration-porn-paralympians-know-it-when-they-see-it.html19. Allan Fallow, “In ‘Between You & Me,’ a Copy Editor Explains the Uses of Usage,” Washington Post, April 24, 2015. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/eats-shoots-and-punctuates/2015/04/23/70983c2a-c2b5-11e4-9271-610273846239_story.html20. Jason Antrosio, “Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond: Against History,” Living Anthropologically, July 7, 2011. https://www.livinganthropologically.com/archaeology/guns-germs-and-steel-jared-diamond/21. https://www.redletterchristians.org/the-dangers-of-poverty-porn/22. Timothy Recuber, “Disaster Porn!” Contexts 12, no. 2 (2013): 28–33. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/153650421348769523. Recuber, “Disaster Porn!”24. David McGlynn, “Look Back in Wonder,” The American Scholar, May 4, 2023. https://theamericanscholar.org/author/david-mcglynn/.25. Janell Ross, “The Tyre Nichols Videos Demand Solemnity, Not Sensationalism,” Time, January 27, 2023. https://time.com/6250959/tyre-nichols-video-reactions-essay/26. Charles M. Blow, “Tyre Nichols’s Death Is America’s Shame,” New York Times, January 27, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/27/opinion/tyre-nichols-video.html27. Nancy Bauer, “Pornutopia,” N + 1, Issue 5: Deciviliaing Process, Winter 2007, https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-5/essays/pornutopia/28. Tatum Hunter, “AI Porn Is Easy to Make Now. For Women, That’s a Nightmare,” Washington Post, February 23, 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/02/13/ai-porn-deepfakes-women-consent/29. Nancy Bauer, How to Do Things with Pornography (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015).30. C. Thi Nguyen and Bekka Williams, “Why We Call Things ‘Porn,’” New York Times, July 26, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/26/opinion/sunday/porn.html?searchResultPosition=131. John McWhorter, “The Secret Lives of Words,” New York Times, January 10, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/10/opinion/words-language-meaning-evolution.htmlAdditional informationNotes on contributorsRobert MyersRobert Myers is professor of anthropology and public health emeritus at Alfred University, Alfred, New York. His academic emphasis has been studying American culture, especially themes of fun and violence, while paying attention to patterns of speech including gunspeak and warspeak metaphors. He is past president of the General Anthropology Division of the American Anthropological Association, spent 2 years on a Fulbright Senior Fellowship in Nigeria and in recent years has been exploring Arctic communities in Nunavut, Greenland, Alaska and Svalbard.