"Speaking of Books" with Dr. Robin Sawyer

If you heard laughter emanating from McKeldin library last night, you can blame the lively group of students, faculty, and community folks who attended Dr. Robin Sawyer’s presentation on sexual response in college students.

A nationally recognized expert, award winning filmmaker and author of multiple books, Dr. Sawyer offered advice, answered questions, and read passages from his book “Sexpertise” during the roughly hour and a half presentation.

Dr. Sawyer’s talk bounced between stern criticism of ineffective and out-dated educational practices and the effervescent wit and humor that his students have come to know him for. While parts of his lecture may cause us to get blocked by some search engines (particularly a story about a room for of students, a video, and an uncomfortable pizza man), I’ve included some highlights and photos below.

--Dr. Sawyer credits the creation of his book "Sexpertise" to the students in his more than 23 years of Human Sexuality classes. Year after year, he found that students had many of the same questions about sex and relationships, and so he collected some of the most pertinent questions into the book. While he's written text books before, he says, “I wanted to write something that is a little pop culture—add a little wit and humor to it.”

--One of the main topics that Dr. Sawyer returned to throughout the evening was how the emergence of new technologies has fundamentally changed the way that young people interact and think about sex. Examples he found included text messages, which allow people to be much "spicier" than they are in normal interactions, and the internet, which served as the de facto sex ed teacher for many in the audience.

--This was my introduction to Dr. Sawyer, and I was surprised by how funny he was. Whether through describing outdated sexual attitudes or how students interact, he had the mixed audience rolling like a late night talk show host. Who knew we had the Jay Leno of libido, the Letterman of lust, the Johnny Carson of copulation in our school?

--As funny as parts of the lecture were, Dr. Sawyer's question and answer period showed him speaking with strength and candor about the what he sees as the abyssmal state of the sexual education in America. When only a few hands were raised to say that they had at least a semester of high school sexual education from a qualified teacher, he remarked, “That represents the sex education in America today—doesn’t exist.”

He did go on to say, though, that sexual education needs to happen not only at school but also at home. For everything that happens in the classroom, Dr. Sawyer said "I can't teach your kid values," and proposed that both sides need to do more to teach children about sex.

--Tim Hackman, a librarian for the humanities who also helped organize the event, said that it was one of their most popular since starting the "Speaking of Books" series. As I counted around the room, I'd put the attendance at around 80 to 90.

Enjoy your Valentine’s Day.