BDSM Practices in Contemporary Poland

“Through a granular ethnography of kink cultures in Poland, Szpilka’s new book shatters boundaries between queer, feminist and trans studies and offers a long overdue, fresh perspective on the theory and practice of BDSM. Refusing to settle for queer framings of sexual cultures as relevant to the extent that they are redemptive or subversive, BDSM Practices in Contemporary Poland enquires instead into the radical relationality and irreducibility at the centre of kink practices. As sexual cultures are increasingly under attack by governments in Poland, and elsewhere, Szpilka’s research reminds us that desire exists in a different register to politics. BDSM has never been politically correct. What, then, makes it possible and practicable?”

—Emily Cousens, Northwestern University London

“Jay Szpilka's work is built to answer a highly interesting research question, founded on solid field work, and courageous in its interpretations. It opens a dialogue between Polish scholarship and contemporary queer studies, and showcases not just academic, but literary qualities.”

—Dorota Hall, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland

Based on extensive field research, this book analyzes the way that BDSM is practiced in contemporary Poland, and asks what social, cultural, and political conditions are necessary for BDSM to be possible to practice in the first place. Through a nuanced analysis of the way that practitioners navigate conflicting understandings and politics of kink, this book provides an alternative to Western-centric narratives of BDSM communities, and challenges a number of long-standing notions about the status kink which circulate in sexuality and queer studies.

Jay Szpilka is cultural anthropologist and cultural studies scholar, currently holding a post-doctoral fellowship at the SWPS University in Poland.