Tribadism
Tribadism (/ˈtrɪbədɪzəm/ TRIB-ə-diz-əm)[1] or tribbing, commonly known by its scissoring position, is a lesbian sexual practice involving vulva-to-vulva contact or rubbing the vulva against the partner's thigh, stomach, buttocks, arm, or other body parts (excluding the mouth), especially for stimulation of the clitoris.
[11] In ancient Greek and Roman sexuality, a tribas, or tribade (IPA:/ˈtrɪbəd/ /tribad/),[12] was a woman or intersex individual who actively penetrated another person (male or female) through use of the clitoris or a dildo.
[6] It also came to refer to lesbian sexual practices in general, though anatomical investigation in the mid-eighteenth century led to skepticism about stories of enlarged clitorises and anatomists and doctors argued for a more precise distinction between clitoral hypertrophy and hermaphroditism.
[6] Author Bonnie Zimmerman stated, "More often, however, [European] writers avoided the term, instead euphemistically invoking 'unnatural vice,' 'lewd behavior,' 'crimes against nature,' 'using an instrument,' and 'taking the part of a man.
Goodman elaborated that in one libel, Marie-Antoinette is described as generously providing details of her husband's "incapacity in the venereal act" and that her lust resulted in her taking an aristocratic beauty Yolande de Polastron, the Duchess of Polignac (1749–1793), "into [her] service" and later specifying that what makes sex with a woman so appealing is "Adroit in the art of stimulating the clitoris"; Marie-Antoinette is described as having stated that La Polignac's attentions produced "one of those rare pleasures that cannot be used up because it can be repeated as many times as one likes".
[9] By the time the Victorian era arrived, cited Zimmerman, "tribadism tended to be constructed as a lower class and non-Western phenomenon and often was associated with the supposed degeneration of prostitutes and criminals".
[6] Fricatrice, a synonym for tribade that also refers to rubbing but has a Latin rather than a Greek root, appeared in English texts as early as 1605 (in Ben Jonson's Volpone).
[4][22] Vaginal penetration by use of the fingers or by use of a dildo may be accompanied, and so sometimes "mutuality and reciprocation tend not to be the main objective, although satisfaction for both partners through different means most definitely is its aim".
[8][24] Scholar Judith Halberstam stated, "If we trace the use of the term forward into present, we find that tribadism is one of those rarely discussed but often practiced sexual activities, and the silence that surrounds it now is as puzzling as the discourse it produced in earlier centuries."
[8] According to older studies, "approximately one-third of lesbian women used tribadism, or body contact, as a means of achieving orgasm (Saghir & Robins, 1973; Jay & Young, 1977)".
[2] In 2003, Julia V Bailey and her research team published data based on a sample from the United Kingdom of 803 lesbian and bisexual women attending two London lesbian sexual health clinics and 415 WSW from a community sample; the study reported that 85% of the women engaged in tribadism (which included genital-to-genital contact or rubbing genitals against another part of a partner's body).
Genital-genital and genital-body contact (including tribadism) can spread STIs such as human papillomavirus (HPV), pubic lice (crabs) and herpes.
[27] The term additionally received mainstream recognition after the episode "Duets" of the television series Glee had characters Santana Lopez and Brittany S. Pierce reference scissoring while making out.
[38][39] Smith et al. argued that while the portrayal of scissoring in Blue Is the Warmest Colour may be considered "entirely lesbian" and "expunging men" because it is non-penetrative sex between women, "the positions chosen seem based more on their ease to photograph/film in a way that provides maximum exposure of both female bodies, as well as an inability to imagine, or depict within heterosexual representational norms, fulfilling sex without direct genital-on-genital contact.
