Linda Williams is a Film Studies Professor at the University of Berkeley and originally worked on the topic of musicals and melodramas. She is the pioneer of Porn Studies.
It started with the idea of one article about pornography. She assumed that there are certain „body genres“ that move us, give us bodily impulses. These are films that make us laugh, cry, frighten us or in the case of porn, arouse us sexually. She then tried to apply her theories from musicals to pornography. In both of these genres, there are narrative scenes, but also the „numbers“: in musicals; the songs, in porn; the sexual sequences.
What should have been one article became an entire book called „Hard Core“. Also her edition of „Porn Studies“ should be on every bookshelf of people interested in Porn Studies. Ironically, she also gave the name „Porn Studies“ to the field, but still, years later and with an established academic field and even a journal with the same name, she still objects to the term. In her opinion it expresses too much affection and a too casual perspective on the matter, to be suitable for academic endeavors, which she explains in my interview.
When I met her at the Academy of fine Arts in Vienna, she gave a speech at an event called „Feminist Idols“. President of the University, Andrea Braidt, introduced her as the „Mother of Porn Studies“. Linda Williams countered jokingly: „The grandmother maybe“. We sat down for a chat later on:
Introduction by Patrick Catuz, Host of the Series
Clarissa Smith, University of Sunderland
Feona Attwood, Middlesex University London