Eroticism

From ArticleWorld

Eroticism is a term that describes something that makes an individual feel sexually stimulated and is often associated with literature or art that is intended to evoke sexual or romantic feelings in the individual exposed to it.

Art and Literature

Eroticism is a term that has a dual usage. Historically, eroticism has literary and artistic intent and is used to describe a piece of work that conveys a sexual meaning in generally a positive way. For example, a piece of literature can be described as involving a lot of eroticism. Many works of romance, historical literature and art carry eroticism as the central them. There is a genre of fiction called erotica that is defined as fictional writing used for the specific purpose of stimulating sexual desire.

Erotica is related to but not equivalent to pornography in that erotica tends to be more artistic and focused on the romantic aspect of love and sexual activity. Pornography, on the other hand, generally carries little or no erotic content (in the artistic sense). It is purely involved in that which involves the sexual act itself and generally has content that is considered socially unacceptable to some people in Western culture.

Sexual Feelings

Eroticism can also define the state of having sexual feelings. In some circles, it means that an individual has an excessive amount of sexual feelings or is overly sexually excitable. Such a person may be engaging in pornography, sexual fantasy or can have sexual fantasies that depart from societal norms. Using the term “having eroticism” in this way is not in general use.