Emily Nagoski
{{Short description|American sex educator and researcher}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Emily Nagoski
| honorific_suffix =
| alma_mater = Indiana University Bloomington{{cite web |title=Emily Nagoski {{!}} Speaker |url=https://www.ted.com/speakers/emily_nagoski |website=TED |language=en}}
| notable_works = Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Change Your Sex Life, Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, Come Together: The Science (and Art!) of Creating Lasting Sexual Connections
| occupation = Sex educator, author, professor
| organization = Smith College
| relatives = Amelia Nagoski (sister), Steph Nagoski (sister)
| module = {{Infobox scientist
| child=yes
| thesis_year = 2006
| thesis_title = An Agent Based Model of Disease Diffusion in the Context of Heterogeneous Sexual Motivation
| thesis_url = https://scholarworks.iu.edu/dspace/handle/2022/7351
| doctoral_advisor = David Lohrmann, Erick Janssen
}}
| website = https://www.emilynagoski.com
}}
Emily Nagoski (born 1977){{Cite web |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-1601106533|title=The Come as You Are Workbook : a practical guide to the science of sex|website=nla.gov.au|access-date=2021-05-22|quote=Creator: Nagoski, Emily, 1977-}} is an American sex educator and researcher, and author of books including Come as You Are.{{cite web |last1=O'Connell |first1=Meaghan |title=Take Back Your Sex Life |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/26/well/take-back-your-sex-life.html |website=The New York Times |date=27 December 2020}} She is the former director of wellness education at Smith College, where she taught a course on women's sexuality.{{cite web |last1=Stevens |first1=Heidi |title='Come As You Are' just might save your sex life |url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-sex-science-relationships-book-balancing-20150226-column.html |website=Chicago Tribune |date=February 26, 2015}}{{cite web |title=7 Sex Education Lessons From Emily Nagoski's 'Come As You Are' |url=https://www.wbur.org/radioboston/2015/03/12/emily-nagoski |website=WBUR |language=en}}
Early life and education
Emily Nagoski earned a PhD in health behavior from the Indiana University School of Public Health and a master's degree in counseling from Indiana University. She has worked as a researcher at The Kinsey Institute.{{Cite news |last=Badham |first=Van |date=2015-04-28 |title='You're normal!' is science's battle cry in the fight for sexual liberation |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/28/youre-normal-is-sciences-battle-cry-in-the-fight-for-sexual-liberation |access-date=2024-03-01 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}
Career
For eight years, she was the director of wellness education at Smith College. In 2016, after the success of her first book, she became a full-time writer and public speaker. In addition, she operates a podcast, a newsletter, and a social media presence which sometimes features a puppet named Nagoggles.{{Cite news |last=Pearson |first=Cathering |date=January 18, 2024 |title=She Wrote a Best Seller on Women's Sex Lives. Then Her Own Fell Apart. |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/18/well/family/emily-nagoski-book-come-together.html |work=The New York Times |access-date=March 1, 2024}}
= ''Come as You Are'' =
Come as You Are was published in 2015. The book discusses the difference between "spontaneous" and "responsive" sexual desire,{{cite web |last1=Dahl |first1=Melissa |title=The Way You Understand Your Sex Drive Is Wrong |url=https://www.thecut.com/2015/04/maybe-no-one-has-a-real-sex-drive.html |website=The Cut |language=en-us |date=8 April 2015}} with Nagoski estimating that only around 15% of women experience the former. She also discusses "arousal non-concordance",{{cite web |last1=Juzwiak |first1=Stoya |last2=Juzwiak |first2=Rich |title=Why This Book on Understanding Your Sexual Desires Has Been Slate's Bestseller for Two Years |url=https://slate.com/human-interest/2021/02/come-as-you-are-sex-advice-book.html |website=Slate |language=en |date=11 February 2021}} estimating, based on experiments of responsiveness to sexual stimuli, that there is a roughly 50% overlap between what stimuli men consider "sex-related" and "sexually appealing", compared with only 10% for women.{{cite web |last1=Badham |first1=Van |title='You're normal!' is science's battle cry in the fight for sexual liberation |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/28/youre-normal-is-sciences-battle-cry-in-the-fight-for-sexual-liberation |website=The Guardian |language=en |date=28 April 2015}} The book popularized the metaphor of a car accelerator and brakes, representing reasoning to engage and avoid sex, respectively. It argued that when women lack sexual desire, the reason is not always a lack of "acceleration" but instead too many brakes. The Guardian praised the "lightness of Nagoski's tone combined with the book's happy, of-course-you're-normal message."
= Writing and speaking career =
In 2019, Nagoski and her twin sister Amelia co-wrote the book Burnout, on the causes and management of stress, including structural factors that particularly affect women.{{cite news |last1=Carey |first1=Anna |title=Twin sisters aim to help women cope with stress caused by sexism |url=https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/health-family/twin-sisters-aim-to-help-women-cope-with-stress-caused-by-sexism-1.3838013 |newspaper=The Irish Times |language=en |date=April 5, 2019}}{{cite web |last1=Sethi |first1=Shikha |title=Mental Health: 8 useful resources you can find online and offline to check in with yourself |url=https://www.gqindia.com/live-well/content/mental-health-useful-resources-you-can-find-online-and-offline-to-check-in-with-yourself |website=GQ India |date=12 May 2021}} They contrast the relatively short-term dynamics of stress in evolutionary times with modern-day stressors that often go unresolved, and discuss forms of affection and physical activity that help complete what they call the "stress cycle".{{cite web |title=Beating Burnout: Sisters Write Book To Help Women Overcome Stress Cycle |url=https://www.npr.org/2019/05/05/720490364/to-help-women-kick-burnout-sisters-write-book-to-understanding-stress-cycle |website=All Things Considered |publisher=NPR |language=en |date=May 5, 2019}}
Come Together: The Science (and Art!) of Creating Lasting Sexual Connections was published in 2024. It was inspired by dry spells in her own marriage, and it was the first time she publicly discussed her own sex life. The New York Times called it "the product of an academic who loves data." In the book, Nagoski stresses that the priority of sex should be pleasure, not frequency, orgasm count, or novelty.{{Cite web |last=Shelasky |first=Alyssa |date=2024-01-31 |title=Does Sex Have to Suffer in Long-Term Relationships? |url=https://www.thecut.com/article/emily-nagoski-sex-long-term-relationships.html |access-date=2024-03-01 |website=The Cut |language=en}}
She appeared in The Principles of Pleasure, a Netflix docuseries about sex.{{Cite news |last=Ashley |first=Beth |date=2022-03-23 |title=The orgasm gap: can Netflix's new sex ed show revolutionise women's lives? |url=https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2022/mar/23/the-orgasm-gap-can-netflixs-new-sex-ed-show-revolutionise-womens-lives |access-date=2024-03-01 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}
Personal life
References
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Category:Indiana University Bloomington alumni
Category:American sex educators
Category:Smith College faculty
Category:21st-century American women writers
Category:American women academics