Accompanying the lectures, debates, seminars, fashion shows, concerts, discussions and sweepstakes that are taking place from Feb. 13-18 on Yale's campus is a new 60-page full-color glossy publication that will be distributed at selected campuses nationwide.
Nearly 25,000 copies of "Sex Week at Yale: The Magazine" will be handed out at 18 of the country's best-known universities, including all schools in the Ivy League. About 500 copies of the publication will be distributed at Dartmouth throughout the week.
"We wanted to bring the experience outside of just Yale," said Dain Lewis, SWAY director and magazine publisher. "It would even be a shame if it were limited only to Yale because it's just that good."
The magazine, as well as the SWAY events, are intended to address many of the relationship issues that young people experience everyday. SWAY's organizers hope it will help create an ongoing national dialogue about the disconnect between what young people are taught about sex in school and society and what they actually experience. "What's so important about this magazine is that it's a compilation of professional perspectives on love, sex and relationships submitted just for this publication," Lewis said. "The magazine explores all outlooks and opinions and does not favor any mindset or ideology."
Among the contributors to the magazine are Jim Griffiths, President of the Playboy Entertainment Group, John Gray, Ph.D., author of "Men Are From Mars Women Are From Venus" and columnists from such publications as Cosmopolitan, Men's Health and Maxim.
Yale's Sex Week will also host professionals from various industries, including media executives, relationship therapists, models, professors, sports stars, porn stars and a former Catholic priest.
While coordinators of Yale's Sex Week believe the event maintains a level of integrity, the event has been nationally criticized in the past. In 2004 the event was labeled as a "week of offensive events" in The Vanderbilt Torch, Vanderbilt's Conservative and Libertarian magazine.
"'Sex Week' is another example of how traditional values are being demonized at America's colleges and universities in favor of politically-correct brainwashing," The Vanderbilt Torch wrote.
Despite past criticism, Lewis believes that it is essential for these issues to be discussed on university campuses.
"Universities are doing a disservice to students by not exploring these issues adequately," Lewis said.
He hopes that other colleges and universities will follow the philosophy of Sex Week by presenting students with a variety of opinions and information on sex in today's society.
The extent to which such issues are discussed at this event at Yale raises the question of whether or not they are sufficiently addressed at Dartmouth.
While assistant director of the Center for Women and Gender Alysondra Duke thinks Dartmouth is doing a good job in addressing issues surrounding sexuality, she also believes there will always be more room for discussion.
As part of Dartmouth's V-Day week, which includes two performances of the Vagina Monologues, the Center will be holding the 4th annual Sex Festival in Collis Commonground this evening.The Festival, which was started in the interest of promoting dialogue about healthy sex and sexuality, will hold a number of booths with the primary purpose of educating students. In addition to tables from Planned Parenthood and Mentors Against Violence will be booths on S&M, safe sex items and sex toys.
Although this three-hour event does not compare in scope to Yale's Sex Festival, Duke believes that the event adequately addresses issues of healthy sex and sexuality. Duke hopes to see a larger student-initiated event related to the Sex Festival organized in the next couple of years.
Rena Fried '08, a member of the SexEd Peer Advisor Program, stated that Dartmouth's focus on the "negative aspects of sex," such as sexual assault, is one of the main problems in how the College addresses sex and sexuality.
Fried and four other Dartmouth students began the SEXtra Credit program earlier this year in response to the lack of discussion and programming about consensual sex that they perceived on campus.
The group, which held a discussion on masturbation last term and which plans to put out a publication of students' writings in the spring, hopes to encourage students to think more critically about their own sex lives, sexualities, and relationships to sex.
While Fried believes that Dartmouth is still lacking in the way it addresses healthy sexuality, she feels that the College is heading in the right direction with increased programming to stir up conversation on these issues.
