Touch: Sex, Sexuality And Sensuality

by Tiffany Kagure Mugo (Editor), Kim Windvogel (Editor)

Intimacy and love, past shame and hurt, current pleasure and play, or going disappointment or surprise? What comes to mind when you think about sex?

Touch explores sex as a vast, yet intertwined experience with oneself and between people. It draws on the on the experiences of sex from people accross genders, sexualities – even borders. Sometimes political, sometimes personal, and often beautiful, Touch delves into the many ways in which sex features in our lives.

Sex can be fun, tricky, and heart-breaking, and this book covers all this and much more. Compiled by Tiffany Kagure Mugo and Kim Windvogel, the pieces are real, expressive, cathartic and dare we say it, sexy.

Featuring essays by Jamil F Khan, Mia Arderne, Siya Khumalo, Nakhane Toure, Roché Kester, Lester Walbrugh, and Efemia Chela, among others.

Genres: Nonfiction

224 pages, Paperback

Published June 1, 2021

About the author

Tiffany Kagure Mugo is co-founder and curator of HOLAA! a Pan Africanist hub that advocates for, and tackles issues surrounding African female sexuality. She is a TEDx speaker, host of the radio show Between The Sheets on Transafrica and a Board Member of FRIDA Fund. She has stories and pieces in over half a dozen anthologies and contributes to a host of spaces speaking about sex and politics. She is a psychology major and future sex therapist whilst currently being a sex and relationship conceptual expert. She was previously an Open Society Youth Fellow. She wrote Quirky Quick Guide to Having Great Sex (Kwela Books, 2020). During her down time she looks for existential answers on the rims of wine glasses and is a polymath for no pay. She lives in Joburg.

Reviews

[Mbaliyekhethelo Kumalo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book really nails the different ways that sex and sexuality manifests and it is AMAZING to see these stories told by African folks. There is everything. Every. Thing. Read it!

[Efemia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sexy, sharp and surprising at every turn! A must-read.

[Jen Thorpe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved!

Diverse. Doesn't shy away from the ups or downs of sex and sexual pleasure.

A meaningful contribution.

[Jessica Doran · Rating 4 out of 5]

Deliciously vulnerable and validating

[Khanyi Nkosi · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really delicious collection of stories. So much diversity and so many ways you can see yourself in this spectrum.

[Mbali (flowahh_) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I always find reviewing anthologies difficult, especially ones that are so vast even in their specificity but I guess that perfectly captures “sex, sexuality and sensuality” - an experience so fluid and yet we always try and contain it, label it in our efforts to “make it make sense”.



Part of my experience of this anthology was that I took it everywhere with me - it followed me when I went on a staycation, it took a trip to Cape Town and even spent some time in Phokeng, I just couldn’t get enough of it but I also made sure to pace myself.

I don’t even know where I’d begin when it comes to my actual experience of the book. Some of the work made me rethink and question my perception of sex, some made me giggle and blush, while others made me shed a tear or two (or three).

It fully touched on how sex features in our lives - from it being a fun and exhilarating experience to the more icky feelings of heart-break and isolation. 



If you have read this anthology, tell me your faves? Because I am still trying to figure mine 🤭

[Anya Tiepelt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading this collection of raw, real and touching (*wink wink) essays got me all in my feels and happy about it. Each essay created it's own world that I got the privilege to climb into and inhabit briefly, and the perspectives both affirmed my gender and sexuality and allowed me to question them even further. This is a collection of fresh voices telling important stories about their own lived experiences from our South African/African perspective which is so very needed. Thank you for this powerful work!

[Shaun · Rating 3 out of 5]

Educational, raw, honest, captivating. A needed anthology

[Burouge · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book, that change something in your inner and deepest sea, takes you with its waves, from story to another, from a dream to another, you melt in the contradictions and the similarities you share with every one of those brilliant human beings.

This book found a way to me from South Africa.
I felt seen, read, visible, heard, written and alive, so alive.

It is a gentle touch and a whisper of a miracle.
It makes you believe that we are this miracle.

[Zoe]

My favourites from this collection, as they appeared:
Let me Show You - Uvania Naidoo
Pink Walls - Boni Mnisi
1000 Nights of Silence with You - Mia Ardene
The Ceilings I've woken up Underneath - Mamello Sejake
Hearing Voices - Lyle Lackay
Dialogue - Thiruna Naidoo
Can't Touch This - Efemia Chela
Strokes - Janine Samuels

[Keitumetse Taunyane · Rating 1 out of 5]

A book I didn't need to read.
Wish I had read reviews before.
It's great for people wanting to hear about queer life.
I had hoped it would cover a spectrum of sexuality and sensuality... I suppose there's plenty others to try and I was very much not the target market.
At least I picked one sentence from it.
Beautiful cover.

[Gozie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deliciously queer and expansive

[Cheraé · Rating 5 out of 5]

Real. Raw. Provocative.
A few of my favourites are:
Kim Windvogel, Uvanua Naidoo, Mia Arderne, Katlego K, Lyle Lackay and Thiruna Naidoo!
Beautiful writing, by some beautiful people.
Thank you for this collection.