Rough Sex

Sexual Practice and the Limits of Consent

Alexandra Fanghanel (University of Greenwich)

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Hardback

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English

Edinburgh University Press
31 December 2025

Gender & the law; Criminology: legal aspects; Criminal law & procedure; Criminal justice law; Offences against the person

Over the past twenty years there has been an increase in the number of cases where women have been killed or injured by men during a sexual encounter and where the perpetrators have claimed that what occurred was consensual rough sex. Colloquially, this has become known

in media and political discourses most notably

as the-'rough sex defence'. Claiming rough sexual practice was consented to can work to reduce a charge of murder to manslaughter, one of manslaughter to accidental death and to mitigate sentencing when perpetrators are found guilty. This occurs against a legal background in the jurisdiction of England and Wales where, in law, it is impossible to consent to sexual violence which is more than transient or trifling and where much sexual practice that might be called bondage and sadomasochism (BDSM) is criminalised.

In this book, Alexandra Fanghanel interrogates this tension by examining what is going on when a defence that rough sex occurred consensually is raised. Analysing the text of court transcripts where such cases have arisen, the author scrutinise the discourses, assumptions and forms of knowledge that are mobilised when making these claims.

Rough sex 'defences' and the politics of BDSM have received increasing attention in socio-legal studies over the past few decades with increasing scholarship devoted to this field. At the same time, there is a considerable amount of ambiguity when it comes to understanding how these cases are treated in a socio-legal context. This book offers readers unparalleled insight into how cases like these play out in practice. It intervenes in contemporary socio-legal discourses about gender, sexuality, deviance and desire. It tells us more about what is taken for granted, what is assumed and what is overlooked in how consent is discerned and operationalised in these cases against a background of contemporary rape culture.

By: Alexandra Fanghanel (University of Greenwich)
Imprint: Edinburgh University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 234mm, Width: 156mm,
ISBN: 9781399541572
ISBN 10: 1399541579
Pages: 168
Publication Date: 31 December 2025
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Alexandra Fanghanel is Academic Portfolio Lead for the undergraduate Criminology programmes at the University of Greenwich

Reviews for Rough Sex: Sexual Practice and the Limits of Consent

In the high-stakes and shifting ground of complicated sexualities, Rough Sex probes the legal and social implications of sex culminating in women’s death. With a bold examination of the boundaries between pleasure and pain, eroticism and murder, Fanghanel interrogates spectacular sexualities that entangle bondage, consent, violence, mortality and sex-positivity. -- Elisabeth Sheff, CEO Sheff Consulting, author of The Polyamorists Next Door What a breath of fresh air! Dr Fanghanel asks hard-hitting questions that trouble definitions of consent and rough sex, while modeling critical and expansive thinking at the intersection of sex and violence. Read this book if you’re looking for a way to break free from the constraints of psycho-socio-sexual oppression! -- Dulcinea Alex Pitagora, Psychotherapist, Sexologist, and BDSM Expert