Faculty Fellowship Thea Cacchioni
Dr Cacchioni's research examines the medicalization of sex, gender, and sexuality, broadly, as well as through specific diagnoses such as Female Sexual Dysfunction and Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. I am interested in the ways in which doctors, psychiatrists, and more recently, drug companies shape understandings of ‘normalcy’ and ‘deviance’ across categories of gender, race, and class. My work examines the pathologization of some sexual acts and identities and the 'healthicization' of others. I am also a pharmaceutical drug regulation activist. I have testified twice at the US Federal Drug Administration against an ineffective desire drug with several harmful side-effects, hyped in the media as a ‘pink Viagra.’ This experience is documented in my book Big Pharma, Women, and the Labour of Love. I am currently working on UVic Faculty of Humanities funded study titled ‘Understanding and Experiences of Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome.’
