Compulsory
framework shaped feminist discussions
Heterosexuality
DANIELLE ANTOINETTE HIDALGO
California State University–Chico, USA
TRACY ROYCE
University of California, Santa Barbara, USA
The term “compulsory heterosexuality”
entails a critique of heterosexuality, laying
bare its socially constructed, institutional
nature. Compulsory heterosexuality posits
that although heterosexuality is frequently
represented as innate or freely chosen,
heterosexuality is instead the result of “com-
pulsory” social arrangements that normalize
opposite-sex relationships while erasing,
marginalizing, and pathologizing same-sex
affection and sexuality.
According to Seidman (2009), lesbian
feminist and gay liberationist movements
of the 1960s and 1970s laid the ideological
foundation for an understanding of het-
erosexuality as structural and institutional.
However, the term “compulsory heterosex-
uality” originated with the publication of
Adrienne Rich’s influential lesbian feminist
essay, “Compulsory Heterosexuality and
Lesbian Existence” (1980). In her article,
Rich asserted that compulsory heterosexu-
ality was deeply ingrained in our political
institutions and everyday lives. For Rich,
heterosexuality was not a matter of personal
preference, but rather had to be “maintained
by force” (1980: 648), ensuring men’s dom-
ination of women both within relationships
and in society at large. Rich also argued that
feminist scholarship has utilized compul-
sory heterosexuality as its foundation, often
The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Social Theory. Edited by Bryan S. Turner.
© 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2017 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
DOI: 10.1002/9781118430873.est0064
failing to acknowledge how this underlying
of marriage, the family, and gender and
sexuality.
Rich’s understanding of compulsive het-
erosexuality has been influential for subse-
quent generations of sexuality scholars and
served as a precursor to the widely adopted
concept of “heteronormativity” as well as “the
heterosexual imaginary” (Ingraham 1994).
Similar to Rich, Ingraham argues “that the
heterosexual imaginary in feminist sociolog-
ical theories of gender conceals the operation
of heterosexuality in structuring gender and
closes off any critical analysis of heterosexu-
ality as an organizing institution” (1994: 203).
Utilizing critical discussions of compulsory
heterosexuality, Rich, Ingraham, and sub-
sequent sexualities scholars have called for
a rethinking of our social institutions, our
everyday practices, and our understandings
of gender, sex, and sexuality.
In her later years, Rich became critical of
some aspects of her original formulation of
compulsory heterosexuality, eventually deny-
ing permissions for reprints of her classic
essay in anthologies. Nonetheless, decades
after its first publication, Rich concluded,
“What I believe had lasting usefulness is
the critique of the presumption that het-
erosexuality is ‘beyond question.’ That new
generations of young women have met with
that critique for the first time in my essay
only indicates how deeply that presumption
still prevails” (Rich 2004: 10).
SEE ALSO: Feminisms; Gender Theory;
Heterosexism and Homophobia;
Heterosexuality; Homosexuality; Lesbianism;
Patriarchy; Sexualities
2 C OMPULSORY HETERO SEXUALIT Y
REFERENCES
Ingraham, Chrys. 1994. The Heterosexual Imagi-
nary: Feminist Sociology and Theories of Gen-
der. Sociological Theory, 12(2): 203–219.
Rich, Adrienne Cecile. 1980. Compulsory Hetero-
sexuality and Lesbian Existence. Signs: Journal of
Women and Culture in Society, 5: 631–660.
Rich, Adrienne Cecile. 2004. Reflections on “Com-
pulsory Heterosexuality.” Journal of Women’s
History, 16(1): 9–11.
Seidman, Steven. 2009. Critique of Compulsory
Heterosexuality. Sexuality Research and Social
Policy, 6(1): 18–28.
FURTHER READING
Dean, James J. 2014. Straights: Heterosexual-
ity in Post-Closeted Culture. New York: NYU
Press.
Hidalgo, Danielle Antoinette, Barber, Kristen, and
Hunter, Erica. 2007. The Dyadic Imaginary:
Troubling the Perception of Love as Dyadic.
Journal of Bisexuality, 7: 171–189.
Jackson, Stevi. 2006. Gender, Sexuality, and
Heterosexuality: The Complexity (and Limits)
of Heteronormativity. Feminist Theory, 7(1):
105–121.