Virginity Loss in Reel/Real Life: Using Popular Movies to Navigate Sexual Initiation Author(S): Laura M

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Virginity Loss in Reel/Real Life: Using Popular Movies to Navigate Sexual Initiation Author(s): Laura M. Carpenter Source: Sociological Forum, Vol. 24, No. 4 (Dec., 2009), pp. 804-827 Published by: Wiley Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40542597 . Accessed: 02/09/2014 15:17

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This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions SociologicalForum, Vol. 24, No. 4, December2009 (© 2009) DOI: 10.11 1 1/j. 1573-7861 .2009.01 137.x

VirginityLoss in Reel/RealLife: Using Popular Movies to NavigateSexual Initiation1

Laura M. Carpenter2

This studyexamines virginity-loss movies as toolsfor navigatingearly sexual life. Data comefrom qualitativecontent analyses of 25 moviesand in-depthinterviews with 61 sociallydiverse women and men,focusing on 28 participantswho reported using movies to make sense of virginityloss. Filmsare open to multipleinterpretations and youngpeople use themcreatively, both prospectively and retrospectively.Discrepancies between participants' personal storiesand the scriptsin nominatedfilms werepatterned by genderand "nonideal"experiences were resolvedmore positively in moviesthan in real life. Such discrepanciesmay increasefeelings of distressafter "imperfect"virginity-loss encounters.

KEY WORDS: adolescence;culture; mass media; sexuality;text and meaning;virginity loss.

INTRODUCTION

Virginityloss, an experiencewidely perceived as one of the major turning pointsin sexual life,is, not coincidentally,one of the most commonthemes in media depictionsof teen sexuality(Carpenter, 1998, 2001). Popular TV shows such as Dawson's Creek (1998-2003) and How I Met YourMother (2005-present); movies such as AmericanPie (1999) and The 40 Year Old Virgin(2005); and magazines such as Seventeenand CosmoGirl!consistently juxtapose ado- lescentsintent on givingtheir virginity to a "true love" withdevotees of casual sex and youthwho see firstsex as a step in growingup. In short,more than one understanding- or scriptfor virginityloss is available in U.S. popular culturetoday. How adolescentswho are exposed to multipleinterpretations of virginity come to preferone over the others was one of the questions that inspired me to undertakea qualitative study of virginityloss in the contemporary United States (Carpenter,2005). Among the issues covered in my interviews with 61 socially diverse women and men was how, when, and fromwhom

1 The author thanks Robin Leidner,Sam Kaplan, JenniferC. Lena, Meika Loe, and Constance A. Nathanson. Departmentof Sociology,Vanderbilt University, VU Station B, Box 1811, Nashville,Tennessee 37235; e-mail:[email protected].

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This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions UsingPopular Movies to NavigateSexual Initiation 805 theylearned about virginityloss and sexuality.My interviewguide included a seriesof open-endeditems specifically about virginity loss in movies,television,magazines, pornography, and othermass media.Though media texts are multivalent,they tend to guide audiencesto particularinterpretations (Hall, 1980);therefore, I expected that participants would report being influ- encedchiefly by mediatexts that attributed the same meaningsto virginity loss as theydid. For example,a man who was ashamedof beinga virgin mightrecall watching many TV showsthat depicted virginity as a stigma. Yet, manyof thepeople I interviewedremembered being influenced by materials in whichtheir own viewsabout virginitywere minimizedor absent. Othersreported using media retrospectively,to make sense of experiences afterthe fact. Thisarticle explores young people's use of mediatexts through an analysis of the interviewsI conducted and the popularfilms cited in thoseinter- views.The questionsmotivating this study are: What culturalscenarios for virginityloss appearin movies?How do thesescenarios map to theinterper- sonalscripts that unfold in youngpeople's lives? What uses - prospectiveand retrospective- do individualsmake of virginity-lossmovies in theirown lives, especiallygiven those movies' multivalence? How do peoplenegotiate discrepancies(or similarities)between movies and reallife?

DEFINING TERMS

It is worthclarifying what I mean by virginityloss. Althoughmost Americansdefine virginity loss as occurringthe firsttime a womanor man engagesin vaginalsex, manydisagree as to whethervirginity can be lost throughother sexual practices, such as sex betweensame-sex partners, het- erosexualoral or anal intercourse,and rape (Bergerand Wenger,1973). All the heterosexualwomen and menI interviewedsaid theylost theirvirginity throughvaginal sex, whereas many of thelesbigay respondents reported losing theirvirginity via oral or anal sex withsame-sex partners (Carpenter, 2005). Out of respectfor thisdiversity, I deferto individuals'own under- standingsrather than imposing a singleuniform definition on theirexperi- ences. Notably,all but three of the filmsI viewed for this project unquestioninglyequate virginityloss withfirst vaginal sex. The Incredibly TrueAdventure of Two Girlsin Love (Maria Maggenti,1995) impliesthat womencan lose theirvirginity with one anotherand ChasingAmy (Kevin Smith,1997) featuresa debate about whether,and throughwhat sexual acts, a woman can lose her virginitywith anotherwoman. In Clueless (Amy Heckerling,1995), three friends question, but ultimatelyaffirm, the vaginalsex virginityloss equationas theydiscuss the relationshipbetween (unspecified)foreplay and virginity.As Dionne (StaceyDash) puts it: "My man is satisfied,he's got no cause forcomplaints. But technically,I am a virgin."

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SEXUAL SCRIPTS AND MEDIA RECEPTION

Three bodies of literatureinform the present analysis: the scripting approach to sexuality;sociological studiesof media receptionand the uses of culture;and interdisciplinaryresearch on mass media's effectson adolescent sexuality.

Sexual Scripts

Developed by Gagnon and Simon (1973), the sexual scriptsapproach con- ceptualizespeople's sexual lives as governedby sociallylearned sets of desires and conductin additionto (or insteadof) biologicalforces. Sexual scriptsexist at threeinterrelated levels (Simon and Gagnon, 1986, 1987). At the societal level,the culturalscenarios created and disseminatedby social institutionslike mass media serveas sexual "roadmaps" thatpeople can consultto guide their choices about when,where, how, why,and withwhom theyshould be sexual. The virginity-lossstories featured in movies are culturalscenarios. A variety of culturalscenarios may be simultaneouslyavailable in a singlesociety; however, some scenariosmay be perceivedas specificto particularsocial groups, such as gay men or heterosexualwomen. At the level of social interaction, people "write" interpersonalscripts when theyinteract with one another,influ- encingand beinginfluenced by one another'ssexual conductand beliefs.Inter- personal scripts often entail improvisationson cultural scenarios, as when potentialsexual partnerssee differentbehaviors as ideal and must findways to compromise.The individual,or intrapsychic,level of scriptingrefers to people's particulardesires, fantasies, and intentions(which are shaped by cultural scenariosand interpersonalscripts). The presentanalysis focuses on the cul- turaland interpersonallevels of sexual scripts.

Media Reception

Mass media play a major role in transmittingcultural scenarios for sexuality.Media images typicallyreflect the prevailingvalues and behaviorsof the societiesin which theyare created and, in turn,help reproducethose values and behaviors(even as media contentchanges over time,in ways that both reflectand fostersocial change) (Fiske, 1989; Hall, 1980; McCracken, 1993; Pleasance, 1991). Yet, people are not uncriticalconsumers of media messages, nor are the meaningsof media productsfixed and unitary.Rather, consumers activelynegotiate among multiplemeanings, albeit withinlimits set by the texts. Many studiesof media receptionhave focusedon how membersof partic- ular social groups interpretmedia productsto fittheir own needs and inter- ests. For example,Shively (1992) foundthat American Indian and Anglo men

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Using PopularMovies to NavigateSexual Initiation 807 livingin a reservationtown interpretedmovie Westernsin similar- but by no means identical- ways. Both groups identifiedwith the white "good guys" ratherthan the Indians, and deemed action, beautifullandscapes, and happy endingsto be Westerns'essential ingredients. However, the Indian men espe- ciallyvalued the movies'celebration of the freeand independent"cowboy way of life,"whereas the Anglo men enjoyedthe moviesas authenticportrayals of pioneer history.College-educated Indians living off the reservation,on the otherhand, identifiedwith the Indian charactersand feltthat Westernswere racist.In short,people's social locationsprofoundly influence their interpretations of culturalproducts. Shively concluded that the men in her studyused Westernsto affirmtheir ethnic groups' values, ideals, and way of life,and as a fantasyrealm in whichto explorevalue conflicts.(For additionalwork on uses and interpretationsof culture,see Griswold [2000], Swidler[2001, 2008], and Vaisey [2008].)

Teensand Mass Media

Many parents,politicians, religious leaders, and journalists take it for grantedthat mass media have powerful,largely deleterious effects on adolescents' sexual lives. But untilrecently, few empirical studies attempted to assess thisclaim. Surveysroutinely find that teenageboys and girlscite mass media as one of the top sources from which they have learned about sexuality (Harris et al, 1991; Steele, 1999; Strasburger,1997). However, many adolescents also say that theydistrust the informationthey obtain fromthe media and that they more often follow the advice of friendsand familymembers (Treise and Gotthoffer,2002). Nor are teens' interpretationsof media products any more monolithicthan adults'. For example, Ward and colleagues (2002) found that college students' perceptionsof sexual relationshipson prime-timeTV series were patternedby genderand preexistingbeliefs about sex. Brown et al (2006) found that sexual content in media differentially impactedwhite and African-Americanteens' sexual behavior. Still, many adolescentsreport consciously emulating some of the behaviors theysee in media and assessingtheir own beliefsand actions in comparison. Ethnographicand interviewstudies by McKinley (1997), McRobbie (1994), and Christian-Smith(1990) (among others) reveal that young women consultmass media images to guide theirdecisions about sexual activityand otheraspects of life(see also Radway, 1984). Of particularinterest is Steele's (2002) explorationof the ways a raciallydiverse group of adolescentmen and women interpretedand used movies. Drawing on focus groups, media jour- nals, "room tours,"and in-depthinterviews, Steele found that althoughstudy participants'movie preferencesand the social activitiessurrounding movie - viewingwere patternedby genderand race, one film HigherLearning (John Singleton,1995) - strucka chord across social groups. Teens used this explo- sive tale of race relationsand sexualitynot only to reaffirmtheir existing

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 808 Carpenter beliefsabout race, gender,and sexuality,but also to questionthose beliefsand to entertainnew perspectives.On balance, mass media appear to play a rein- forcingrole in sexual socialization,with youth generally attending to materials that reinforcetheir existing beliefs and values, but sometimesusing media to explorenew approaches. Longitudinalstudies have linked youths' sexual conduct to their con- sumption of media with sexual content. Brown et al. (2006) found that 12-14 year-oldwhite boys and girlsexposed to media dietshigh in sexual content- based on a measureweighting the frequencyof sexual contentin movies, TV shows, music albums, and magazineseach teen used regularly- were sig- nificantlymore likelyto have had sex by ages 14-16 than white teens with media diets lowerin sexual content,even aftercontrolling for other predictors of sexual activity.The relationshipwas not statisticallysignificant for black teens,possibly because (as the authorscontend) black youthformed their sexual expectationsearlier than white youth or because (as Milkie's [1999] research suggests) the relative absence of people "like them" in most media enables black youth to dissociate themselvesfrom media depictionsof sexuality.

METHODS

Data for this articlecome fromtwo sources: 61 interviewswith a diverse group of youngadults and 25 moviesthey cited as havingprospectively or ret- rospectivelyinfluenced their understandings of virginity.More specifically,I focuson the 14 womenand 14 men who mentionedspecific movies and the 20 filmsthat explicitly address virginity.

Interviews

In 1997-1998,I interviewed33 women and 28 men, aged 18 to 35, about theirbeliefs and experiencesrelated to virginityloss. They came fromdiverse racial-ethnic,social class, and religiousbackgrounds and about two-thirdsself- identifiedas heterosexual,while one-thirdself-identified as gay, lesbian,bisexual, or queer (GLBQ). (See Table I.) Fifty-sixdescribed themselves as nonvir- gins at the timeof the study;their average age at virginityloss was 16.4. To locate studyparticipants, I used a theoretically-drivensnowball sample (Biernackiand Waldorf,1981; Glaser and Strauss,1967).3 My chieftheoretical concern was representingdiverse social backgroundsand a range of sexual

3 Snowball sampling helped me locate members of numericallyrare and relativelyinvisible groups,like GLBQ men and women and "secondary" virgins,and to overcomepeople's reluc- tance to participatein researchon topics perceivedas private.To enhance sample diversityand to offsetthe relativehomogeneity of most social networks,I began 17 snowballs and inter- viewedno more than fivepeople in each.

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Table I. InterviewParticipants (All Compared withMovie Nominators)

EntireSample (N = 61) Movie Nominators(N = 28)

Gender Women 54.1(33) 50.0(14) Men 45.9 (28) 50.0 (14) Racial-EthnicBackground White 78.7 (48) 78.6 (22) AfricanAmerican 9.8 (6) 3.6 (1) Latino/a 6.6(4) 7.1(2) Asian American 4.9 (3) 10.7 (3) Age/Generation 18 to 25 54.1(33) 53.6(15) 26 to 35 45.9 (28) 46.4 (13) ReligiousAffiliation (Current)* MainlineProtestant 34.4 (21) 21.4 (6) ConservativeProtestant 16.4 (10) 17.9 (5) Roman Catholic 26.2 (16) 17.9 (5) Jewish 13.1(8) 21.4(6) None/atheist 9.8(6) 21.4(6) Sexual Identity Heterosexual 63.9 (39) 57.1 (16) Lesbian, gay, bisexual 36.1 (22) 42.9 (12) Social Class Background** Middle class 67.2(41) 71.4(20) Workingclass 32.8 (20) 28.6 (8) interpretationof Virginity(at Timeof VirginityLoss***) Gift 31.1(19) 25.0(7) Stigma 31.1 (19) 32.1 (9) Process 31.1(19) 39.3(11) Honor God 1.6(1) 0.0(0) Irrelevant 4.9 (3) 3.6 (1)

*Currentreligious affiliations match religiousbackgrounds with the exceptionof one mainline Protestantand one Roman Catholic who became conservativeProtestants as adults. **As measuredby parentaleducation and occupation. ***At timeof interview,for virgins. beliefsand experiences.After locating initial respondents through professional contactsand special-interestorganizations, I thenasked each personto recom- mend otherswho mightbe willingto participate.Because snowball samples are neitherrandom nor representative,they cannot be used to establishthe overall distributionof beliefsor behaviorsin a broader population.However, a sufficientlydiverse snowball sample is well-suitedfor illuminatingthe range of ideas and experiencesavailable in a givensocial group (like youngadults in the United States), and the ways that they are patternedby social identity. When I expressmy findingsin termsof statisticalpatterns, I do so not to implythat they can be generalizedto youngAmericans as a whole,but to give a more precise picture than is possible throughqualitative expressions like "some" and "most." The in-depth,semi-structured interviews lasted from 1 to 3 hours and covered topics includingthe definitionand meaningof virginityloss; sources of informationabout virginityloss; and the respondent'spersonal sexual

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 810 Carpenter history,particularly experiences related to virginityloss. The interviewseg- menton informationsources began withthe statement:"Now I'd like to talk about how you learned about virginity- not only what it was, but also what affectedyour ideas about it." Aftera series of questions about people with whom the respondent"ha[d] talked with about virginity"(family, peers, teachers,doctors) and beforequestions about formalsex education and reli- gion, I said:

Now I'd like to ask about what you may have seen or heard about virginityfrom some differentkinds of mass media. Do you rememberseeing or hearinganything about virginityfrom television programs? Movies or videos? Magazines? Books/novels?Comic books? Radio? Music? Pornography?Any othersources? For each typeof media, I asked a seriesof follow-upquestions.

Which ones? When did you see them?What did you see/hear/learn?Did you discuss what you heard/saw/learnedwith anyone?Did you findwhat you heard/saw/learned helpful?How/when? These conversationswere often less structuredin practice, allowing respondentsto highlightissues thatmattered to them,but everyinterview covered the same categoriesof information.Movies and other mass media also came up spontaneouslyat otherpoints in the interviews. Some participantsmentioned specific characters and plot points, while othersdiscussed films and theircontent in more generalterms. I did not ask whichsources of informationhad been most influential,although some participants offeredsuch rankings.Most respondedto my questionsabout the tim- ing of media exposure in broad terms (e.g., "that movie Nine 1/2 Weeks, everyone... rentedit in high school"; Marcy Goldberg,27, white,heterosexual), makingit difficultto develop detailed chronologiesof media influences. (All respondentnames are pseudonyms.)The interviews'retrospective nature no doubt precludedgreater specificity for some in my study.However, broad answerslike Marcy's and the contextof respondents'comments enabled me to determinewhether they consumed specific media sourcesbefore or aftervirginity loss. Many describedmovies (and other media), along with parentsand peers, as relativelyearly sources of information- in elementaryor middle school. Only one, Kelly Lewis (24, white,heterosexual), recalled a filmas her firstexposure to the conceptof virginity.

There was a movie,and everybodywas talkingabout it in fourthgrade, called the Last AmericanVirgin. I had no idea what that was. And I asked my mom what a virgin was. I don't rememberher answer .... But that's I thinkwhere I, the firsttime I ever heard the word virgin. To analyze the interviews,I reliedon a modifiedform of the systematic inductiveprocedures referred to as groundedtheory (Charmaz, 2006; Glaser and Strauss,1967). Ratherthan imposingmy preconceivednotions about how people mightinterpret virginity loss, I read transcriptsof each interviewmulti- ple times,allowing salient themes to emerge.Through this procedure, I discov- ered that almost everyonein the studymade sense of virginityloss through

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions UsingPopular Movies to NavigateSexual Initiation 811 one of threemetaphors, comparing virginity to a gift,to a stigma,or to a step in the process of growingup (aka, riteof passage). (For more details on this analysis,see Carpenter[2005].) At the time of theirown virginityloss (or the interview,in the case of virgins),19 people saw virginityas a gift,19 as a stigma,and 19 as a step in a process. One virginheterosexual woman (a devout conservativeProtestant) likened premarital virginity to an act of worship and threenonvirgin gay men (fromdiverse backgrounds) described virginityas irrelevantto their own experiences.4Each of these metaphorical interpretationssuggests an ideal script- a culturalscenario - for virginityloss (detailed below). These interpretationswere neither static nor sharply bounded. Many participantswere familiarwith metaphorsto which theydid not personallysubscribe. One-third of the people I spoke with reinterpreted virginityover time,typically (in 17 of 22 cases) afterthey lost theirvirginity.5 My analysis focuses on respondents'interpretations at the time of virginity loss (or the interview,for virgins)because most respondents(23 of 28) used movies prospectivelyand because 8 of the 12 who cited movies and reinter- pretedvirginity made that reinterpretationafter virginity loss. (Exceptionsare noted as relevant.)

Movies

Of the 61 people I interviewed,52 eithertold me that theyremembered seeingor hearingabout virginityfrom the mass media I inquiredabout or discussed specificmedia at another point in the interview.Movies were mentioned by 28 respondents,magazines by 19, pornographicmagazines/videos by 16, televisionprograms by 15, books by 13, advertisements/billboardsby4, songs by 3, and role-playinggames (e.g., Dungeons & Dragons) by 2.6 Four participantsdid not cite specificexamples, but feltthat mass media had influenced their understandingof sex. Kevin Cleary's (22, white, heterosexual) responsewas typical.

From the timea guy is 6, he's seeing images of how to fulfillphysical love, on television, on the radio, he's hearing,pictures, wherever, magazines. Every single one of these imagesreiterates that when you get thisfeeling ... the thingto do is to fulfillit by, you know,inserting tab A into slot Β [laughs]. Five respondentsdid not thinkthat mass media influencedtheir under- standingsof virginity.For example,Cindy Passmore (32, white,heterosexual) 4 The 2004 independentfilm Saved! (Brian Dannelly), in whicha devout conservativeProtestant teen becomes pregnantwhen she has sex to "cure" her boyfriend'shomosexuality, depicts pre- maritalvirginity as an act of worship. 5 Most commonly,respondents who initiallysaw virginityas a stigmacame to see it as a step in a processafter losing their own virginity. The most-citeditems were the TV show BeverlyHills 90210, Seventeenand Cosmopolitanmaga- zines, Playboy/Penthouse/ Hustler, and books by JudyBlume, especiallyForever. Role-playing games ofteninclude "medieval" elementslike rescuingvirgins. Only one respondentmentioned a pornographicvideo by name: Deep Throat,which had a theatricalrelease in 1973.

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 812 Carpenter respondedto my query:"I can't say as I do .... I don't rememberit [virginity loss] beingadvertised much." The presentanalysis focuseson movies for several reasons. Movies were mentionedmore oftenin my interviewsthan any othersingle form of media and wereequally likelyto be cited by womenas men (whereasmagazines were typicallynominated by women and pornographyby men). Additionally,movies are more easily traced and recovered than general or hard-to-specify sources, like "reading Cosmo" or "looking at Web sites." Mainstreamfilms also tend to have self-containedplots that lend themselvesto bounded analyses, whereas TV series featuremultiple plot lines across many episodes and magazinescover virginityloss only sporadically. Respondents who mentionedmovies resembledthe sample overall in termsof social characteristics,although men, Asian Americans,GLBQ people, Jewishand nonreligiousindividuals, and products of middle-classfamilies were slightlyoverrepresented, while AfricanAmericans, mainline Protestants, and Roman Catholics were somewhatunderrepresented. (See Table I.) Movie- nominatorswere also more likelyto have viewed virginityloss as a step in a processand less likelyto have seen it as a gift. Twenty-fivemovies were cited by name, with nine being mentionedby two or more participants.(See Table II.) Five people mentionedmovies in more generalterms (e.g., "teen movies," "queer-themedmovies"). One named John Hughes, a director/producer/writerresponsible for three of the nominated movies {Sixteen Candles, Prettyin Pink, and The BreakfastClub), as well as severalother popular mid-1980steen movies (e.g., FerrisBueller's Day Off, 1986). The majorityof the filmsin the sample were made in the 1980s and early 1990s, the period duringwhich most of the respondentsgrew up, and thus learnedabout virginityloss. However,many of the youngerwomen and men cited filmsthat premieredwhen theywere preteens,which they saw then or later as video rentalsor on cable television.Of course, movies that premieredafter I collected my data, such as the 1999 summerblockbuster AmericanPie, whichrecounts four high school boys' pact to lose theirvirginity,were not available fornomination. I viewedall 25 moviesat least once (typicallytwo or threetimes), paying particularattention to virginity-relatedplot elements.For each film,I took detailednotes, which I subsequentlycoded in termsof contentcategories (e.g., location of virginity-lossencounter) and overarchingthemes (e.g., virginity depicted as a gift). My analysis relies on the ethnographiccontent analysis methoddeveloped by Altheide(1996). AlthoughI expectedthat some themes would emergethrough the viewing/codingprocess, I was most keen to discover whetherthe moviespresented virginity from the same metaphoricalper- spectivesas those held by the people I interviewedand what sortsof virginity- relatedscripts unfolded on the screen. Twentyof the movies directlyaddressed virginityand/or virginityloss (some extensively,some briefly),while five included themes related to sexuality but not virginityper se. As shown in Table II, these movies can be further

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Table II. Movie Themesby Individuals'Interpretations of Virginityat VirginityLoss

Movies by DominantTheme/Frame (Date Released) [#of Nominators]

Person's Not About Interpretation Virginity of VL Gift Stigma OtherVirginity Per Se

Gift Clueless(1995) The Graduate(1967) - 9-1/2 Weeks 10 movies Prettyin Pink Last American (1986) [2] 7 nominators ( 1986) Virgin(1982) Ten ( 1979) (19 possible) SixteenCandles Revengeof the (1984) Nerds('9S4) RiskyBusiness (1983) Summerof '42 (1971) Stigma SixteenCandles Porky's ( 198 1) [2] Once Bitten 1984 ( 1984) 7 movies (1984) [2] Fast Timesat (1985) 8 nominators BreakfastClub Ridgemont ( 19 possible) (1985) High ( 1982) [2] EndlessLove (1981) Process SixteenCandles Porky's (1981) [2] ChasingAmy* Sound of 15 movies ( 1984) [2] Fast Timesat ( 1997) [2] Music ( 1965) 12 nominators Prettyin Pink (1986) Ridgemont The IncrediblyTrue (19 possible) BreakfastClub High (1982) Adventuresof Two (1985) Last American Girlsin Love* (1995) For Keeps?(1988) Virgin(1982) Halloween**(1978) Clueless(1995) LittleDarlings Scream**(1996) "JohnHughes (1980) movies" Losin' It (1983) Irrelevant/Act - - - A Chorus of Worship Line (1985) 1 movie 1 nominator (4 possible) 6 movies 9 movies 5 movies 5 movies

♦Movies withsame-sex virginity loss themes. **Movies with"virginity as supernaturalpower" themes. categorized according to the dominant virginity-lossscripts they featured. Based on my readings,six movies foregroundedplots depictingvirginity as a gift,nine treatedvirginity primarily as a stigma,and five featuredvirginity- relatedstories that did not closelyfit one of the metaphoricalscripts favored by the people I interviewed.Three of theselatter five {Once Bitten,Halloween, Scream) treatedvirginity as conferringsupernatural powers; for example, in Once Bitten(Howard Storm, 1985), a woman vampiremust drinkthe blood of threevirgins lest she begin to look her age.7 The othertwo - ChasingAmy and The IncrediblyTrue Adventureof Two Girls in Love- addressedsame-sex virginityloss but not in ways clearly comprehensiblein terms of the gift, stigma, or process metaphors. Although none of the nominated movies 7 In Halloween (and many other horrorfilms), the only survivoris a femalevirgin (see Clover, 1992),a factmade much of in the 1997 satire/homageScream.

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 814 Carpenter emphasizeda distinctprocess script, several contained elements suggesting this interpretation(see below). With the exceptionof ChasingAmy and IncrediblyTrue Adventure,these - moviesare populatedalmost exclusively by characterswho are heterosexual as well as whiteand middle class. The people I interviewedwere more diverse, however;and researchreveals that firstsexual experiencesare patternedby race/ethnicity,social class, and sexual identity(although such differenceshave narrowedsince the 1960s) (Joynerand Laumann, 2001; Savin-Williams,2003; Upchurchet al, 1998). Severalof thenominated films, including Pretty in Pink, Little Darlings, The Breakfast Club, and Clueless, query the relationship betweensocial class and sexualityby depictingworking-class youth as more "promiscuous"than their middle-class counterparts and/or including characters who believethis stereotype. Although a numberof popular moviesstarring and directedby AfricanAmericans feature virginity loss themes(e.g., Cooley High, 1975; House Party, 1989; Boyζ Ν theHood, 1991), none of the people I inter- viewedmentioned them. In Clueless,the one nominatedfilm with black actors in lead/supportingroles (as the whiteheroine's best friendand her boyfriend), romanticand sexual relationshipsare depictedsimilarly across race.

FINDINGS

Three Waysof UsingMovies to Make Sense of VirginityLoss

The people I interviewedused movies to make sense of virginityin three distinctiveways. Twentyspoke of using filmsas sourcesof informationabout virginityloss while theywere stillvirgins. Dan Levy (29, white,heterosexual) recalled:

There was the movie Porky'sthat probably came out when I was 13 and thatdefinitely talked about, you know, virginity.One of the ... nerdycharacters on there,they kept callinga virgin.So thatmight have been a veryconcrete way forme to get what virgin- itywas .... That it was a bad thing. In some cases, movies influencedviewers by providingexamples they rejected.Jessica Tanaka (28, Japanese-American,bisexual) discussed"a movie ... about some girl losing her virginity"{Fast Times) only to conclude, "I thinkI thoughtit was stupid." (See also Dana's commentabout Revengeof theNerds, below.) Four participantsindicated that movies had retrospectivelyhelped them interpretor explain theirvirginity-related experiences to themselvesor others. For example,Ed Winters(28, white,bisexual) likenedhis own previrginity-loss interactionswith peers to an incidentfrom The BreakfastClub (JohnHughes, 1985). In that scene, "the Brain" (AnthonyMichael Hall), accused of being a virgin,claims that he had sex witha girlhe met on vacation in Niagara Falls (he laterrecants). Said Ed:

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The whole virginitything was like the one thingthat you could lie crediblyabout .... I mean, it could be just like, you know, "My many conquests in the Niagara Falls region."I loved The BreakfastClub. In Ed's view,the filmaccurately captured an aspect of his life. Eightrespondents retrospectively compared their virginity-loss experiences to expectationsthey derived prospectively from movies (specificor generally) when they were still virgins.(Two of these eight also used movies prospectively,like Dan, and two used them retrospectively,like Ed.) Accordingto Marcy Goldberg(27, white,heterosexual):

I thoughtit [virginityloss] would feellike, really,really, really good, like, the way they describe,you see it in movies. These women yellingand screamingand throwingtheir heads around. And it wasn't like that. No bells rang,no, you know, no rainbowcame out of the sky [laughs].... [I]t was just somethingthat had happened,it didn't last that long and it wasn't thatgood. Consideringthe "prospective"and "comparison" categoriestogether, 26 (of 28) participantsreported using movies in some prospectivemanner.

Participants'Ideal and Actual Virginity-LossScripts

Each of the metaphorsused by the people I interviewedsuggests an ideal scriptfor virginityloss, rooted in genericexpectations for gifts,stigmas, and ritesof passage. (On metaphoricalthinking, see Lakoff and Johnson[1980]; for a more detailedanalysis, see Carpenter[2005].) People who describedvir- ginityas a giftidealized a scenarioin whicha virginwould give her/hisvirgin- ity to a beloved partner,who would in turn reciprocatewith the similarly valuable giftof love and deepened commitmentto the giver (Mauss, 1954; Schwartz,1967). Many saw a returngift of virginityas ideal, but insufficient for reciprocation.For men and women who saw theirvirginity as a stigma, the ideal scenario was one in which a virginrid himselfor herselfof that shamefultrait, preferably as soon as possible,without incurring any additional stigmas,such as a reputationfor sexual ineptitude(Goflfman, 1963; Joneset al., 1984). Many in this group attemptedto conceal theirvirginity from peers and potentialsexual partners.Individuals who likenedvirginity loss to a step in a processor a riteof passage envisionedscenarios in whichthe virginwould gain new knowledge(about sexual activityor about himselfor herself)and be transformed(as froma child into an adult); theyoften compared these plots to otherfamiliar transitions in status,like high school graduationor marriage (Glaser and Strauss,1971; Turner,1969; van Gennep, 1908). In practice,each of these metaphors(cultural scenarios) was associated with two or three typical trajectoriesof experience(interpersonal scripts) before,during, and aftervirginity loss (see Carpenter,2005). Eight of 17 nonvirgin"gifters" told storiesthat closely resembledthe ideal giftscript. Four personallychose to divergefrom the ideal script(e.g., decidingto lose virginity withoutbeing in love) and fivehad experiencesthat divergedfrom the ideal

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 816 Carpenter because of theirpartners' behavior (e.g., being dumped aftergiving one's virginity).Fifteen of 19 nonvirginsin the stigmagroup describedexperiences that closelyresembled the ideal stigmascript, while three were jeered at by partners who discoveredtheir (concealed) virginityor became frustratedby theirsexual inexperience.One had a partnerreact favorablywhen she discoveredhis virginity.All 17 of the nonvirgin"processers" lost theirvirginity in ways that resembledthe ideal rite-of-passagescript; 11 described their encountersas physicallyand/or emotionally enjoyable, while six found the experienceto be physicallyand/or emotionally unpleasant but a worthwhilelearning experience nonetheless.Women were more likelyto interpretvirginity as a giftand men were more likelyto interpretit as a stigma(they favored the process scriptin roughlyequal proportions);however, when men and women shared an interpretationof virginity,they typically experienced virginity loss in similarways.

Did Movie ScriptsReflect Personal Interpretations?

Study participants'interpretations of virginityoften divergedfrom the primarycultural scenarios in the movies that influencedthem. (See Table II.) Three of the 10 movies named by giftersforegrounded gift themes, while five featuredstigma themes. Similarly, two of the seven movies nominatedby the stigmagroup showcased stigma scenarios,while four featuredgift scenarios. Five of the 15 movies cited by processersfeatured gift plots and fiveshow- cased stigmaplots. A closer readingof the filmshelps make sense of thesepat- terns. Although one virginity-lossscript was dominant in each of the 15 "virginitymovies" that featureda giftor stigmascript, all but a fewalso contained alternativecultural scenarios and/or plot elementsthat could be interpreted in more than one way. In other words, most of these movies are multivalent,like the WesternsShively analyzed. (On media texts'tendency to guide consumersto "favored" interpretations,see Hall [1980].) "Gift" movies are exemplifiedby Sixteen Candles (cited by fiverespon- dents), Prettyin Pink, The BreakfastClub, and Clueless (each cited by two). Endless Love and For Keeps? (each cited once) include similarscript elements but address virginityless directly(or extensively).Sixteen Candles (John Hughes, 1984) tells the storyof Samantha Baker (Molly Ringwald),a pretty but otherwiseordinary high school sophomorewhose entirefamily has forgot- ten her 16th birthday.Unbeknownst to Sam, popular senior Jake Ryan (Michael Schoeffling)has intercepteda pencil-and-paper"sex test" in which Sam confessedthat if she were to "do it," she would want Jake for her partner. At that night'sdance, whileJake inquiresabout Sam behindhis stuck-up girlfriendCaroline's back, Sam findsherself besieged by a lust-crazedfresh- man geek (AnthonyMichael Hall). The geek shamefacedlyadmits that he has "never bagged a babe" and pleads withSam to have sex withhim so that he can preservehis "ladies' man" reputationwith his friends(i.e., he feelsstigma- tized by his virginity).She declines,explaining that she's "saving" her virginity

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions UsingPopular Movies to NavigateSexual Initiation 817 forJake. Later that night,after a riotousparty, Jake sends an inebriatedCar- oline (Haviland Mulford)home with the geek. When theywake up together, fairlycertain that theyhad sex, Caroline tells the geek she thinksshe enjoyed it- much to his delightand relief.Meanwhile, Jake has spiritedSam away fromher sister'swedding reception to a romanticfirst "date," completewith birthdaycake. They kiss and Sam says her wish has come true.Jake, in short, appears to be the kind of guy who is worthyof receivingthe giftof a girl's virginity.Similarly, in Clueless, afterMurray (Donald Faison) demonstrates his love for Dionne (Stacy Dash) by patientlyteaching her to drive,she gives him what she sees as the ultimategift: "Dionne's virginitywent from technical to non-existent."In The BreakfastClub, as in Sixteen Candles, the female charactersClaire (Molly Ringwald)and Allison (Ally Sheedy)view virginityas a gift("if you love someone, it's okay") while theirmale counterpartsJohn (JuddNelson) and "the Brain" view it as a stigma(see quote above). Prettyin Pink (Howard Deutch, 1985) likewiseportrays women's virginity primarilyas a gift.The film'sheroine, high school seniorAndie Walsh (Molly Ringwald),is a social outsiderbecause she is poor and has quirkytaste in clothingand music. Her fellowmisfit best friend,Duckie (Jon Cryer),is on the verge of confessinghis abiding love when Andie begins to date wealthy, handsomeclassmate Blane (AndrewMcCarthy). Blane promisesto take Andie to the seniorprom and, convincedthat they love one another,Andie givesher virginityto Blane (in one readingof an ambiguous scene). Shortlythereafter, Blane's friendSteff (James Spader) bullies him into dumpingAndie on the groundsthat she's sociallyinferior and probablypromiscuous besides. Devas- tated,Andie decides to attendthe prom alone, wherea remorsefulBlane begs her for forgivenessand they are joyfullyreunited (with Duckie's grudging approval). The overall "lesson" of the filmis that if you choose the recipient of your virginitywith care, she or he may behave badly at firstbut will wise up in the end. (I do not detecta stigmaplot in Prettyin Pink.) "Stigma" movies are exemplifiedby Fast Times (cited by three respondents), Last American Virgin(cited by two), and Porky's (cited by four; though the plot of Porky's revolvesmore around "gettinglaid" than losing virginity).The remainingstigma movies (with one nominationeach) contain similarscript elements. Young men and women both findvirginity embarrass- ing in Fast Times at RidgemontHigh (Amy Heckerling,1982). (Though a departurefrom traditional norms for women,this portrayalis consistentwith real-lifetrends in the 1980s (Thompson, 1995).) As the filmopens, 15-year-old Stacy (JenniferJason Leigh), a RidgemontHigh freshman,is worriedthat if she remainsa virgin,she'll "fall behind" her peers. Self-styledsexpert Linda (Phoebe Cates) urges her to take action: "It's no huge thing,it's just sex." (LittleDarlings [Ronald Maxwell, 1980] similarlyfeatures two 15-year-oldgirls racing to lose theirvirginity at summercamp.) Lying about her age, Stacy courts Ron (D. W. Brown), a 20-somethingstereo salesman. On theirfirst date, Ron and Stacy have sex in the baseball dugout of a local park, still mostlydressed and having barely conversed. Ron penetratesStacy without

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 818 Carpenter foreplay;she lies passivelyon her back, unarousedand in evidentdiscomfort. (She doesn't mentionher virginity,a reticenceshared by LittleDarlings' Angel [KristyMcNicol].) The next day, Linda comfortsher: "It gets a lot better,I swear." When Ron stops callinga fewmonths later, Stacy decides to pursuemen her own age, but whenshe makes sexual advances towardher classmate, Mark (Brian Backer),he panics and beats a hastyretreat. Stacy thenturns to Mark's friendMike Damone (Robert Romanus), a self-proclaimedladies' man who calls Mark a "wuss" for claimingto be in love with Stacy. Stacy and Da- mone's encounteris awkward: He ejaculates almost immediatelyand moans so loudly, she asks if he's okay. "I thinkI came," he explains. "Didn't you feel it?" Embarrassed,Damone rejects Stacy's friendlyovertures at school. (Neitherboy's virginitystatus is made explicit,but theirawkwardness implies virginity.)Stacy is hurt,confused, and, as it turnsout, pregnant;her brother drivesher to the abortionclinic. These experiences,along with her suspicion that she should be gettingmore pleasure fromsex, promptStacy to begin a new quest. "Anyone can have sex," she declares. "I want a relationship,I want romance." By the end of the movie, she and Mark are in love and dating, but "haven't gone all the way."8 Similarly,at the end of Clueless,it is impliedthat if Cher (Alicia Silverstone)has not yetlost her virginitywith Josh (Paul Rudd), she will soon because he is special and theyare in love. Unfolding alongside Stacy's story is that of her older brother,Brad (JudgeReinhold). A senior,Brad likewiseperceives virginity as a stigmaand is frustratedthat Lisa (Amanda Wyss), his girlfriendof two years,refuses to have sex with him. "I don't want to have to use sex as a tool," she says. (Women "saving" theirvirginity are equally marginal,if not absent,from the other stigmamovies.) It's implied that both are virgins;however, Brad por- trayshimself as sexuallyactive, tellinga co-worker,"I love [Lisa] and all. I mean, she's great in bed." Hoping for betterluck with other women, Brad decides to end the relationship,but Lisa dumps him firstand he can't seem to get a date withanyone else. In short,Fast Timesshowcases the storiesof teens who see virginityas a stigma,but also featurescharacters - Mark, Lisa, and the "reformed"Stacy - whose approach to sex/virginityis more in line with the giftmetaphor. The Last AmericanVirgin (Boaz Davidson, 1982) reinforcesthe conven- tion that men's virginityis stigmatizing,even as it presentsthe possibilityof an alternatestance. The plot centerson threehigh school boys, two of whom are so eager to lose theirvirginity that theyproposition literally every female they meet, and one who assures his friendshe wants casual sex but really wants to wait for love. Rick (Steve Antin),the best-lookingand most socially adept of the three,and David (Joe Rubbo), an overweightwheeler-dealer, lose 8 In virginity-lossfilms of the 1950s and 1960s,such as Wherethe Boys Are (1960), youngwomen who lose theirvirginity are almost always portrayedas irrevocablyruined. The "sufferingwith a happyending" patternseems to have been establishedby the (late) 1970s,as in Grease (1978). See Carpenter(2002) and Douglas (1994).

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions UsingPopular Movies to NavigateSexual Initiation 819 theirvirginity first, to a lonely-but-lovelyhousewife (Louisa Moritz) on their pizza deliveryroute. (Summerof '42 [Robert Mulligan, 1971] and Porky's [Bob Clark, 1982]also featureyoung men competing,respectively, to lose their virginityand "get laid"; in RiskyBusiness [Paul Brickman,1983], Joel Good- sen [Tom Cruise] hiresa call girlto eradicatehis virginitybefore he heads off to college.) Nice-guyGary (Lawrence Monoson) meanwhilefalls head-over- heels for Karen (Diane Franklin),the cute new girlin school. When his awkward attemptsto date her founder,Rick moves in. Pressuredby his friends, Gary loses his virginitywith a prostitutewho mocks him: "You've stillgot a lot to learn, littleboy." Shortlythereafter, Karen gives her virginityto Rick, who pretendsto love her; but when she discovers that she's pregnant,he angrilyrejects her. Gary hocks his stereo to pay for Karen's abortion and, whileshe's recovering,confesses that he loves her. They kiss and Karen seems to returnGary's affections;but withindays, she is back with Rick and Gary is heartbroken.The moral of the storyappears to be that men who value romanceand thinkthat virginity is special don't get the girl. In sum, many of the nominatedmovies showcase one culturalscenario for virginityloss, but also include one or more subplotsfeaturing an alterna- tivescenario (possibly excepting Pretty in Pink and Porky's). Notably,none of the nominatedfilms foregrounds a distinctiverite-of-passage scenario.9 How- ever, since the hallmarksof that scenario are gaining knowledgeand being transformedfrom one statusto another,all the filmspotentially can be viewed througha "process of growingup" lens. For example,Stacy's "practicemakes perfect"quest for physical pleasure suggestsa scenario in which learning about sex is an ongoingprocess.

Movie Plots (CulturalScenarios) Meet IndividualStories (InterpersonalScripts)

To explore the relationshipbetween cultural scenarios and interpersonal scriptsfor virginityloss, I will now compare scenariosfrom the cited filmsto the experiencesof studyparticipants who drew on those scenarios/metaphors and/orused moviesprospectively. The nominatedmovies featurethree basic "virginityis a gift" scripts, which are largelycontingent on the genderof the virginin question. When filmheroines give theirvirginity in a committedlove relationship,they either have positive experiencesor are temporarilyabandoned by, then lovingly reunitedwith, their partners. For example,although Sam remainsa virginat the end of Sixteen Candles, Jake's loving behavior suggeststhat he would respond "properly" to the gift of virginity.(The Dionne-and-Murrayand Cher-and-Joshplots in Clueless do the same.) In Prettyin Pink and Last American Virgin,Andie and Karen believe that their love is reciprocated

9 AmericanPie (1999) does offerfairly distinct versions of all threecultural scenarios.

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 820 Carpenter beforethey give theirboyfriends their virginities and, althoughthe boys subse- quentlyabandon them,they are reunitedin the end (Blane's remorseis genu- ine, Andie's experienceless traumatic).On darker notes, the romance in EndlessLove becomesdangerously obsessive and the For Keeps?couple experience unintendedpregnancy, but both relationshipspersist. Movie men who viewed virginityas a gifthad less positiveexperiences. Gary {Last American Virgin)and Mark {Fast Times) both stand by paralyzedas theirbest friends seduce (or are seduced by) the girlsthey love. Mark ultimatelywinds up with Stacy- after she has decided that sex should be contingenton love- but Gary's miseryseems unlikelyto abate. (These are the only nominatedfilms to treatmen's virginityas a gift.) Things unfoldedquite differentlyfor many of the young people I interviewed.Nine of the 14 women in the giftgroup lost theirvirginity with boy- friendswho reciprocatedtheir gifts with deepened love and commitment.For example,Kelly Lewis (24, white,heterosexual), who "rememberfed]the movie Ten, and watchingBo Derek and wondering[trails off] ... rightaround the timethat I lost my virginity"(though she describedMoonlighting as "the show that kind of pushed me"), feltthat givingher virginityto her beloved boy- friendof two years broughtthem closer togetherand stabilizedtheir some- timesrocky relationship. But none of the four women who were rejectedby theirvirginity-loss partners received an apology or were later reunitedwith them.10Dana Hagy (30, white,heterosexual), who reportedlearning about virginityloss fromPretty in Pink, Sixteen Candles, and Revengeof the Nerds, believedthat giving her virginityto someone she loved would "kind of cement our relationship."Regarding Pretty in Pink,Dana recalled:

Molly Ringwald ... was in frontof a fireand she was withthis guy that she finallygot .... They'redoing something[sexual]. And you feelhappy for,you go, 'Oh, it's so nice, she got the guy," you know, "He loves her." Which I don't thinkis based in reality that much. In my experience,at least. So I sort of romanticizedsex based on a lot of these kind of movies. Not Revengeof the Nerds,but [laughs].More of the, you know, relationshipkind. During her senioryear in highschool, Dana's boyfriendpressured her to have sex withhim: "He kept saying,4It would mean a lot to me,' and Ί love you,' and Ί want you to be the one.'" When she finallyconsented, a week before leaving for college, she feltterrible. "I thought... we kind of crossed a line and now I'm ruined."She didn't feelany closer to her boyfriendand he didn't stop pressuringher, so it wasn't long beforethey broke up. For years after- ward, she feltunworthy of saying"no" to sex she did not want in subsequent relationships.11 In contrast,all threeof the nonvirginmen who saw virginityas a giftfelt that theirgifts had been reciprocatedby their(female or male) partners.None

10 A fifthwoman in the eifterouo lost her vireinitvwhen she was raoed bv a friend. 1] Two othergifter women, neither of whom cited movies,told more classic versionsof the tale, in whichthey were dumped almost immediatelyafter giving their virginities to the boyfriends theyloved. This lack of reciprocationleft them feeling sexually disenfranchised as did Dana.

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions UsingPopular Movies to NavigateSexual Initiation 821 of themtold storiesof watchingthe personto whom theywished to give their virginityrun offwith someone else. Only one of the three,Andrew Lin (19, Asian American, heterosexual),mentioned a movie, The Graduate (Mike Nichols, 1967), whichdepicts virginity largely as a stigma,and that he retro- spectivelylinked to his virginity-lossexperience, insofar as his partner/girl- friendwas "older [by one year]and I was in highschool. Like Mrs. Robinson or something."12Fernando Garcia (21, gay, Cuban American),a virgingifter, reportedusing a movie to deflectquestions about his sexual status.

I was neverashamed to say ... that I am a virgin.I just say that I'm savingmyself for Luke Perry.[LMC: Is that froma movie?]Clueless. It's a line fromthe movie Clueless. Whereshe [Cher]says, "Fm savingmyself for Luke Perry."13 The nominatedfilms likewise feature three gendered scripts that present virginityas a stigma.Movie heroes who interpretvirginity as a stigma- such as Rick and David in Last AmericanVirgin and Joel in RiskyBusiness - typically lose theirvirginity without sexually discrediting incident. Those who conceal theirvirginity are seldom discoveredand when a woman is aware of a man's inexperience,it does not mar the encounter.In Sixteen Candles and Revengeof the Nerds (JeffKanew, 1984), male virginsare even revealed as masterfullovers. However, if Damone's inept encounterwith Stacy is inter- pretedas evidenceof his virginity,then Fast Times offersa scriptin whicha male virgin'sinexperience compounds his shame. Movie women who see virginityas a stigmasuffer all mannerof trauma,from abandonment to unin- tended pregnancy.Fast Times'* Stacy is a case in point, though once she's realizedthe importanceof love, she winds up happilydating Mark. Similarly, in LittleDarlings, tough-girl Angel is surprisedby her emotionswhen she loses her ostensiblystigmatizing virginity to bad-boy Randy (Matt Damon), leading her to push him away (and to hide her virginityloss fromwealthy rival Ferris (Tatum O'Neal). Beforethe movie ends, however,Angel and Randy reconnect in a more romanticfashion. The storiesof the people I intervieweddiffered from these movie scenarios in crucial ways. The four women who approached their virginityas a stigma all favorablyrecalled theirvirginity-loss encounters and had actually benefitedfrom cultural stereotypes about women's sexuality.Emma McCabe (24, heterosexual,white) recalledbeing influencedby Fast Times,especially a scene in whichLinda uses a carrotto show then-virginStacy how to perform fellatio.Such images were one reason that Emma incorporatedoral sex into her earliestsexual encounters:"I'm sure this also had its root in the media representation,that to be a good sexual partnerwas cool. And so ... to give a good blowjob was like, an ego rub for me, you know?" Like Stacy, Emma 12 Referringto the much-olderwoman with whom protagonistBenjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman)loses his virginity.Andrew's experiencedid not resemble The Graduate in other respects,however. He gave his virginityto a girlfriendfor whom he cared deeply;although she returnedhis affection,Andrew decided to end the relationshipafter a pregnancyscare. A primeexample of intertextuality:in one of manyvirginity loss-related plots on BeverlyHills 90210, Brenda Walsh (Shannen Doherty)"gave" her virginityto Dylan McKay (Luke Perry).

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 822 Carpenter was able to lose her virginityfairly rapidly once she electedto do so by propo- sitioninga male friend.But unlikeStacy, Emma didn'tfeel the need to conceal her virginity- she wasn't hidingher age and she feltrelatively secure that few people would see her virginityas a stigma- nor was she rejectedor impreg- nated by her lover. Eleven of the 14 men who saw virginityas a stigmahad trouble-freeexpe- rienceslike Lewis (Robert Carradine) in Revengeof the Nerds and Pee Wee (Dan Monahan) in Porky's, thoughnone were revealedas sexual superstars. Kendall James(28, AfricanAmerican, gay) believedthat popular teen movies had taughthim (whilestill a virgin)that:

Virginwas not cool to be. I mean, you've got Porky's .... Everybodywants to go see it and one kid's a virginand he's a dork and you know,everybody has that kind of men- tality.... I thinkalmost everyteen-like movie, Fast Times at RidgemontHigh, every kind of, teen high school thing,was about gettinglaid or not gettinglaid, and what an idiot you were fornot gettinglaid. Kendall (who also cited Once Bitten) lost his virginityin an encounterhe describedas highlyreminiscent of a teen sex comedy. He got into a playful wrestlingmatch with his friend'solder sister,then: "Wrestlingand erections and curiosityand ...." Beforehe knewwhat was happening,they were having sex on the livingroom floor.Of the seven men who activelyconcealed their virginityfrom sexual partners,four were revealed as virginsor sexuallyinexpe- rienced.Don Coulter(32, white,heterosexual), who named SixteenCandles as an influence,was relievedthat his girlfriendreacted sympathetically, reminis- cent of the tale of the geek. "She didn't admit to [thinkingI was a virgin]," Don said. "She was really good about that. She's like, 'Don't worry.Just come back tomorrowand we'll do this again.'" But the other threefelt ridi- culed or dismissedby their(female) partners in ways thatclosely resemble the storyof Fast Times'sDamone. Dan Levy (28, white,heterosexual), who nominated Porky's, describedhis virginity-lossencounter as "fumbling,"quick, and devoid of pleasure for his older girlfriend.Her frustrationwas apparent,he said, and "[w]e never had sex again .... Because I was a disappointmentto her." Althoughnone of the cited movies showcases a riteof passage scenario, each contains elementsthat permita "passage/process"reading. My interviews with people who favoredthis metaphorare instructive.Matt Bergquist (24, white,heterosexual), who grewup believingthat "[l]osingyour virginity is at least partiallydefined by the experienceyou gained about sex and relationships"- in otherwords, a learningprocess - explainedhow movieslike Sixteen Candles, Prettyin Pink, and Porky's left him feeling"maybe more culture pressurethan peer pressure,watching movies and videos where people who seemed to look ... youngerthan I were losing theirvirginity." Matt lost his virginitywhen he was 16, with his girlfriendof 6 months.They had already engaged in "the whole gamut, up to oral sex" and "finallydecided to have sex, I thinkit was because ... we were both convincedthat thiswas love and this was it." Aftertheir first experience of vaginal sex- "in the back of mom

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Using PopularMovies to NavigateSexual Initiation 823 and dad's stationwagon" (reminiscentof Sixteen Candles' geek)- they remainedtogether, and sexuallyactive, for another year, until they "went off to collegein differentplaces." Matt's interpersonal script contains elements of thegift scenario as depictedin SixteenCandles and Prettyin Pink- he losthis virginityin an enduringlove relationship (albeit not for the reasons that gifters did)- as wellas elementsof Porky's stigmascenario - he did notvalue his virginity- and the processscript. Though he did not cite Fast Times,Matt's experimentationprior to virginityloss ("Playingaround as muchas I did beforeI had sex" suchthat "having sex, intercourse, was [only]a slightlydif- ferent... experience")resembles Stacy's step-by-step search for physical pleasure. It appears that womenand men in the processgroup may have constructedprocess scenarios by drawingon differentplot lines from multiple movies. SeveralGLBQ respondents- who, as a group,were disproportionately likelyto favorthe process metaphor (Carpenter, 2005) - reportedusing movies withsame-sex virginity-loss plots to makesense of whatwere, for them, the intertwinedprocesses of comingout and losingvirginity. Amy Solon (20, white,lesbian), a virgin,interpreted virginity loss as a step in growingup: "Grownups have sex. I am young.If I had sex,would I be a grownup?" Althoughshe had long recognizedher attractionto women,she had begun whatshe called the "steps" of coming out just a yearbefore our interview.

It was a matterof being able to say it .... It was a matterof not feeling,not making myselffeel sick [by thinkingabout sex withwomen] .... Then I actuallyallowed myself to be attractedto women,which was like the third,last, like,"wow!" step. Movieslike Incredibly True Adventure, she said,were helping her to takethat processfurther.

Movies are so cool for that. Movies wheregirls kiss girlsare excellent!Well, for a lot of reasons,but [laughs].They are so good. Like I, 'cause you know ... I can watchthat movie,and like,assess the "ugh" factorin my stomach. Amyhoped that after she becamesufficiently desensitized, she wouldbe able to startdating women and to act on herromantic and sexualdesires, from kissingall theway to virginityloss.

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

The precedinganalysis has revealedthree distinctive ways young people use virginity-lossmovies: prospective, retrospective, and comparative(incorpo- ratingboth prospective and retrospectiveelements). It has also demonstrated, throughconcrete examples, various ways in whichcultural scenarios and interpersonalscripts for virginity loss are linked. The observeddiscrepancy between the depiction of virginityloss in movies and movieviewers' understandings of virginity loss is moreapparent than real,insofar as most(if not all) virginity-lossmovies are open to multiple

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 824 Carpenter

interpretations.Consistent with the work of Radway(1984), McKinley (1997), and Steele(2002), my research indicates that young women and menare active consumersof virginity-lossfilms, attending to certainscenarios (even periph- eralones) and ignoringothers. People who interpret virginity loss as a stepin a processmay use moviesin particularlycreative ways, extracting bits and piecesfrom different plot lines,often in multiplemovies, and reframinggift and stigmascenarios to reflecta processorientation. As Shively(1992) and Wardet al. (2002) have shown,interpretations of moviesare patternedin complexways by the interpreters'social locations. My analysesindicate that people attend to particularscenarios depending on theirgender and on theirinterpretation of virginity. Of the28 studypartici- pantswho nominatedmovies, 22 citedfilms in whicha same-sexcharacter sharedtheir view of virginityloss (or somethingakin to it). For example, Dana citedPretty in Pinkand SixteenCandles, in whichgirls see virginityas a gift;Dan namedPorky' s, in whichmen see virginityas a stigma;and Amy nominatedmovies featuring same-sex encounters that she hoped to emulate someday.The counterexamplesI observed make sensewhen placed in con- text.For instance,Andrew shared the experienceof The Graduate'sBen Braddockin thathe losthis virginitywith an "older"woman, and Fernando campilyidentified with Clueless heroine Cher's desireto "save myselffor Luke Perry." Althoughmany study participants' interpersonal scripts resembled culturalscenarios available in nominatedfilms - thiswas especiallytrue of people whotold "ideal" stories- manydid not.Discrepancies were patterned by gender.When movie plots depart from ideal scenarios,women who see virginity as a giftand menwho viewit as a stigmatend to have positiveexperiences (e.g., Andie,the geek),while men gifters and "stigmatized"women tend to havenegative experiences (e.g., Gary, Stacy). In real-lifeinterpersonal scripts, however,negative experiences were disproportionately common among gifter womenand stigma-groupmen (e.g., Dana, Dan) whilepositive experiences weredisproportionately common among stigma-group women and giftermen (e.g.,Emma, Andrew). Do suchdiscrepancies carry any consequences? Presumably, people whose ownexperiences followed a morepositive trajectory than the cultural scenario withwhich they identified would be happierthan people for whom the reverse was true.Men and womenwho had imbibedmovie plots with improbably happyendings may well have foundit moredifficult to deal withnonideal personalexperiences. For example,Dana and Dan appearednot only to suffer fromill treatmentby theirpartners, but also to berateor punishthemselves becausetheir virginity-loss experiences did not workout the way theywere "supposedto." Conversely,it is possiblethat individuals who had dissatisfying virginity-lossexperiences might retrospectively identify with movies that resolvedstories like theirs in moreideal and satisfactoryways; I did nothear such storiesfrom any of the "retrospective"movie-users in my study, however.

This content downloaded from 134.250.105.219 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014 15:17:42 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Using PopularMovies to NavigateSexual Initiation 825

Taken together,my findingssuggest that youngwomen and men use virginity-lossmovies as "roadmaps" for navigatingtheir sexual relationships(as Gagnon and Simon would predict)and to make sense of, describe,and/or jus- tifytheir experiences retrospectively. My researchalso points to the possibili- ties that teens use films to learn about virginityloss and to fantasize (prospectivelyor retrospectively)about differentkinds of virginity-lossexperiences (as Shivelyand Steele found). That said, because I interviewedstudy participantsonly once, typically retrospectiveto virginityloss, I cannot make definitiveclaims about causality. Most of the people I spoke with used filmsprospectively - they nominated movies that theysaw while virgins,and that theyfelt affected their expecta- tions and/or decisions- although many made retrospectiveuse of filmsas well. (The questionsI asked may have contributedto this pattern,insofar as theyexpressed an interestin "learning"that occurredprior to virginityloss.) However, without knowing what metaphors for virginitypeople favored beforeseeing particularfilms, I cannot determinewhether virginity-loss films primarily reinforced(rather than produced) their understandings.Nor, althoughI explicitlyasked whetherrespondents' beliefs or evaluationsof their experienceshad changedover time,may theyhave been aware of such changes (or theirimpact). Another limitation involves the degreeof detail in the data. Because my study focused broadly on virginityloss, questions about mass media formedonly a small portionof the interviews.For example,I did not ask detailed questions about people's reactionsto or uses of specificmovies (e.g., "With whichcharacter did you identifyand why?"). Interviewsfocused specificallyon moviesor media could furtherilluminate how youngpeople use virginity-lossmovies. Two additionallimitations affect the presentanalysis. First, because people learnedabout virginityloss frommedia otherthan films(e.g., Emma cited the gift-themeteen novel Foreveras well as Fast Times),developing a compre- hensivepicture of the relationshipbetween "mass mediated"cultural scenarios and interpersonalscripts for virginityloss would require examiningall the media thatinfluenced each person.Brown et tf/.'s(2006) researchis commend- able for surveyingteens about four types of media. Second, I have largely assumed(and participants'comments indicated) that people nominatedmovies withwhich they agreed; however,more participantsmay have been influenced by movies that depictedvirginity in ways theyfound abhorrent, ridiculous, or unrealisticthan was apparentfrom the interviews.Incorporating participants' extendeddiscussions of media use, wherepossible, would help shed lighton thisissue. Future analyses could also consider other kinds of patterning,such as betweenspecific "critical moments" in movie plots and interpersonalscripts (e.g., lyingto parents,site of virginityloss). A prospectivestudy (e.g., follow- ing youththrough grades 7-12) would also expand our knowledgeof the relationshipbetween mass media and youths' understandingsand experiencesof virginityloss.

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