The International Encyclopedia of Human Sexuality, First Edition. Edited by Patricia Whelehan and Anne Bolin. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2015 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 1 Virginity and virginity pledges LAURA M. CARPENTER AND HEATHER HENSMAN KETTREY Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, United States The term virginity refers to the state of having never had sex, and virgin to a person in that state. When a virgin has sex for the first time, she or he is typically said to have lost her or his virginity. People disagree about what sorts of sexual acts, with what sorts of partners, result in virgin- ity loss. Before the Enlightenment, and again during the Victorian period, spiritual and moral definitions of virginity prevailed. For example, some experts contended that a woman could lose her virtue (seen as synonymous with virgin- ity) by meeting a man unchaperoned. Around 1900, definitions began to focus on specific physical acts, the traditional—and most common—being a person’s first experience of vaginal–penile sex. Many individuals categorize partnered sexual activities such as oral and anal intercourse as forms of foreplay which do not result in virginity loss. Others posit that one can lose virginity through oral or anal intercourse. The term techni- cal virginity emerged in the 1920s, referring to the practice of engaging in “everything but” those activities believed to result in virginity loss. How people categorize these practices often depends on sexual orientation. Historically, most individ- uals believed that only heterosexual activity could terminate virginity. Yet the increasing visibility and acceptance of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer (LGBQ) individuals has propagated the belief in virginity loss with same‐sex partners. Heterosexual women and men tend to claim that heterosexuals can lose their virginity only via vaginal intercourse, whereas LGBQ people can also lose their virginity through oral or anal sex. LGBQ individuals tend to argue that anyone can lose their virginity through whichever of those acts they engage in first. Debates about whether sexual assault can result in virginity loss highlight an ongoing tension between physiological and moral/emotional defini- tions of virginity. Drawing on feminist analyses of rape as a form of violence, some argue that virginity cannot be lost without consent. Another debate concerns whether sexually experienced individuals can regain their virginity. Although most people maintain that virginity can be lost only once, claims that individuals can, after a period of deliberate abstinence, become a secondary or “born‐again” virgin have proliferated since the late 1980s, especially in conservative Christian circles. Beliefs about the hymen—the protective membrane over the cervix—also reflect this physio- logical/moral tension. Many believe (incorrectly) that a female’s hymen can only be broken through vaginal intercourse. Consequently, lack of blood at first sex is often taken to signify nonvirginity. In medieval Europe, methods to “fake” hymeneal blood abounded (e.g., inserting an ampule of blood in the vagina). In contemporary societies where premarital virginity is highly valued, such as parts of the Middle East and Latin America, hymen reconstruction surgery is growing in pop- ularity. In industrialized countries, such as Japan and the United States, “re‐virgination” surgeries have increased for other reasons. Some media accounts depict sexually experienced women undergoing such operations as a special gift for their male partners. Virginity has been valued since antiquity for social as well as spiritual reasons. Early Jews, Greeks, and Romans believed that male and female virgins possessed special powers. Some medieval Europeans thought that sex with a vir- gin could cure sexually transmitted infections (STIs), a belief that persists in parts of the world today. Early Christians advocated virginity as a means of avoiding sin. After the Protestant Reformation, lifelong virginity lost its appeal for many, but virginity until marriage remained a widespread ideal, especially for women. These historical grounds for valuing virginity persist in many conservative societies. Where women’s vir- ginity is seen as signifying family honor, as in