Negotiating sexual boundaries Mothers/daughters & Sex in Hong Kong & Britain by Prof Stevi Jackson
Abstract Intimacy, as has been noted (Gabb 2008), is a slippery and multivalent concept. In this paper we explore its multiple meanings in relation to accounts of ‘closeness’ (or the lack of it) between mothers and daughters in Hong Kong and the UK, drawing on interviews with two generations of women: young adult women and their mothers. In so doing we distinguish a number of different forms of intimacy emerging from our data: emotional, disclosing/confiding, physical, practical and companionate. Focusing on the managing and monitoring of daughters’ sexuality I draw out some of the differences between the two societies and discuss possible explanations for such differences, locating them within the broader context of family practices and the social organisation of personal life in the two societies.