Peter Alilunas, Closed (to the Profane) Due to Pressure from the Morality Squad: The Cinema 2000, Porn Studies, and Cultural Consecration

The growth of Porn Studies has been accompanied by an exciting surge in research related to adult film history, which has started to fill in long-neglected gaps in traditional film histories. With this growth, however, the field has also slowly begun constructing familiar boundaries and barriers, valuing and foregrounding some objects of study as worthy of scholarly interest while dismissing or ignoring others. To explore these tensions, this presentation explores a wide variety of historical moments, spaces, and places, and foregrounds the Cinema 2000, the legendary Yonge Street adult theater originally created by Max Allen. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s formulations of “legitimate” cultural pleasures—and the ways in which they must be “closed to the profane”—this presentation will ultimately argue for an open and reflexive approach to studying adult film history.

Peter Alilunas
University of Oregon
Cinema Studies 

☛ please register here

co-sponsored by:

Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies
Cinema Studies Institute | Centre for the Study of the United States
Canadian Studies Program | Centre for Ethics

Wed, Oct 24, 2018
04:30 PM - 06:30 PM
Faculty of Information
140 St. George St.