ABSTRACT

From the beginning, geographical work on sexuality (and particularly sexual minority lives) has been completely entangled with the study of urban space (Hubbard, 2011). Because sexual identities, as we currently understand them, have been so significantly shaped by urban life, we start the Companion with a set of chapters that examine urban sexualities. We review some well-established themes, but also start to look differently at urban sexualities. This introduction reviews the linked trajectories of the geography of sexualities and urban geography. In doing so, it acknowledges more recent work on rural and suburban sexualities – recognizing that such work (and the spaces it studies) usually exists in a relationship to urban space and urban-based scholarship.