sexuality

noun

1. (countable, uncountable)The quality of being sexual; that which is characterized or distinguished by sex.

   “Sexuality, then, is related to both biological sex and gender, and simultaneously is quite distinct from them. […] We employ sexuality to refer to all kinds of sexual relations, including sexual activities, eroticism, sexual identities, sexual meanings, and sexual politics.”

   “The asexuality of insects is, in almost all cases, known to be a derived condition. That is, their evolution was contingent on the sexuality of their ancestral forms. Only a few asexual groups are 'species' rich and ostensibly asexual […]”

2. (countable, uncountable)The quality of being sexual; that which is characterized or distinguished by sex.

   “Listening to teenage girls on the telephone discuss for an hour who held whose hand at a party underscores the universal adolescent fascination with burgeoning sexuality.”

   “Millions of people in recovery are going to work on their sexuality. Some identify themselves as recovering sex addicts, some as incest survivors and some simply know they are having sexual "problems." An exciting outcome of this massive energy expenditure is the opportunity to discover the real nature of sexuality. As these millions find out the truth—and live it—the world's sexuality will change.”

   “The blindness that psychoanalysis had for penetrating anal sexuality as an active sexual construct, and for receptive anal sexuality as a possibly vigorous, muscular, and active option, was surely multiply determined, and without doubt related to a similar undervaluation of the active workings and possibilities that can be a part of vaginal receptivity.”

3. (countable, uncountable)The quality of being sexual; that which is characterized or distinguished by sex.

   “As his sexual activity is aggressive, so he is interested in display and in manifestation of his sexuality, if not directly, then in contest against other men. And the whole of his life manifests his inner need to take initiative.”

   “[Thomas] Hardy relies heavily upon the natural object metaphor to provide him with a language of female sexuality that is not of the fastidious, fey, 'lilies-and-lace' category. In keeping with his heterodox views—that a voluptuous woman is a fair product of nature, fit and healthy in body and mind, neither degraded by her sexuality nor mentally or morally degenerate—he relies upon wholesome, 'natural' objects to evoke her healthy sexual appetite.”

   “[S]he often would ask him to come inside the ladies' room and make sure that no one would come inside while she was changing. […] He also was able to see that while unusual requests played into his traditional expectations about sex roles and his desire to protect her and assert his sexuality with her, they were anything but professional. She was, in fact, coming on to him the way he typically imagined a man would come on to a woman.”

4. (countable, uncountable)The quality of being sexual; that which is characterized or distinguished by sex.

   “[T]his prospective gay adoptive father chose not to disclose his sexuality to the caseworker who interviewed him at his home, rather than admit that he was a gay man, in order to avoid being told he could not adopt.”

   “Derek is the only participant to express ambivalence about both his sexuality and his gender identity. Aged 61, he has been married to women twice and has three children. He had no prior sexual encounters with men until he left his second wife in 1999, when he was 48, and began 'experimenting' with sexual relationships with men, soon identifying as gay: […]”

   “You were wearing rainbow gloves / With matching socks / What a display / Of everyday sexuality”

5. (countable, uncountable)The quality of being sexual; that which is characterized or distinguished by sex.