Sexual Orientation

Is asexuality a new orientation?

The myth that asexuality is a ‘new’ identity is only perpetuated as a way to diminish it and to invalidate the very real concerns of asexual people,” ace writer and editor Sherronda J. Brown tells SELF. As early as the 1800s, experts wrote about having a lack of sexual desire, or asexuality, using other names, such as sexual anesthesia, according to Asexual Erotics, a 2019 book by Ela Przybylo, Ph.D., Illinois State University professor of English and women’s, gender, and sexuality studies.