The historic RCSI Biological Society (BioSoc) is the official student society of RCSI and one of the oldest student medical societies in the world.
Trawling through the minutes of BioSoc meetings recently, we were struck by the number of papers delivered on the subject of human sexuality as far back as the early 1940s:
5 March 1942 'Sex and Life', presented by Mr J Carri
5 May 1943 'Homosexuality', presented by Mr R Poole
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| RCSI Biological Society members, late 1940s-early 1950s |
The Science of Sexuality
BioSoc offered an unusually open forum for discussion of sex and sexuality at a time when it was still regarded as taboo within mainstream and medical communities.
Conversations in the public sphere (on the relatively rare occasion that they did occur) tended to discuss sexual behaviours and interests in terms of deviancy, while the scientific community were similarly disinclined to pursue the study and classification of sexuality beyond matters of reproductive health, sexual disorders and dysfunction, and sexually transmitted disease.
The focus on human sexuality within the RCSI Biological Society at this time might also be viewed in the context of a resurgence in interest in the field of sexology after World War II.
Defined as the scientific study of human sexuality, sexology emerged as a scientific discipline in the late nineteenth century. Drawing from fields such as anthropology, biology, psychology, and sociology, sexology adopted an interdisciplinary approach to the study of sexuality in humans.
Morality vs Science
Despite the relatively progressive nature of the topics under discussion at early BioSoc meetings, the language employed and societal attitudes reflected in these discourses is undoubtedly of its time. The very title of the paper ‘Sex Development Normal & Abnormal’, presented at a BioSoc meeting in 1940, makes this clear, with ‘deviations and perversions’ in this development viewed in terms of psychological aberration.
"Mr Early proceeded to deal with the psychological aspect of sex in a very comprehensive manner. He spoke of the various phases of sexual development of man and the deviaitons and perversions which may occur. He stressed the importance of sex education of the general public and of medical practitioners."Nevertheless, these discussions also represent a shift in the portrayal and perception of human sexuality. By positioning sexuality as a field of scientific study , these papers played an important role in moving the interpretation and regulation of sexual behaviour away from moralist judgement and placing the discussion of sexuality on a more scientific footing.
Described as ‘well balanced and well thought out’, BioSoc President, Dr J Lewis, further remarked on the 1942 paper ‘Sex and Life’ ‘that he was glad to see that the speaker presented his paper in a manner befitting a medical student discussing a problem usually side-tracked.’ Other commendations regarding the scientific approach to similar topics across other papers are recorded throughout the BioSoc minutes from this period.
Forward-looking
The first Kinsey Report, Sexual Behaviour in the Human Male, was published in the US in 1948, helping to pave the way for more open discussion and nuanced interpretation of sexuality than ever before.
Several years earlier, in the relatively cosseted cultural confines of 1940s Ireland, BioSoc were engaged in a similar endeavour, advocating for a more scientific, data-driven approach to the study of sexuality in humans, focussed primarily on understanding rather than judgement.