Touched

A Memoir of Child Sexual Abuse and Survival
1. Auflage 2026
ISBN: 978-1-041-23684-9
Verlag: Taylor & Francis

Buch, Englisch, 170 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm

Reihe: Writing Lives: Ethnographic Narratives

Touched: A Memoir of Child Sexual Abuse and Survival chronicles one man’s experience with sexual abuse and his lifelong journey toward healing and self-understanding. Blending memoir and critical theory, Fox invites readers to rethink how we understand harm, memory, childhood, and queerness. This is not simply an account of sexual violation —it’s a story about what it means to hold onto your truth when others try to rewrite or silence it.

Drawing from personal history and childhood artifacts, this book traces the author’s life from early childhood through early adulthood, mapping the long psychological, interpersonal, and cultural reverberations of child sexual abuse. The memoir situates lived experience within broader discussions of queerness and sexual harm, illuminating how silence, shame, and social stigma shape male survivors’ identities. Structured in four parts and interspersed with poetic interludes and theoretical appendices, Touched examines memory’s ethics, child sexual abuse’s “feel-good paradox,” and the process of translating personal violation into intellectual and creative agency. Fox’s tale demonstrates how confronting one’s own history can transform injury into intervention and fearlessly reclaims narrative power from systems that have long misrepresented or erased the sexual abuse of boys and young men.

Offering insight, validation and healing for those coming to terms with abuse’s aftermath, Touched will resonate with adult readers—especially survivors of child sexual abuse. The book also serves LGBTQ individuals, people working in mental health, and anyone who values honest, transformative memoir.

Zielgruppe

General, Postgraduate, and Undergraduate Advanced

Autoren/Hrsg.

Fox, Ragan

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Psychologie Psychologie / Allgemeines & Theorie Psychologie: Sachbuch, Ratgeber
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziologie Allgemein Empirische Sozialforschung, Statistik
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziale Gruppen/Soziale Themen Kindesmissbrauch, Sexueller Missbrauch, Häusliche Gewalt
• Sozialwissenschaften Pädagogik Pädagogik Pädagogik: Sachbuch, Ratgeber

Inhaltsverzeichnis

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

INTRODUCTION

SECTION ONE. Touched: transitive verb, to put hands upon, especially to commit violence

CHAPTER ONE. Bateswood

CHAPTER TWO. Vanderpool

CHAPTER THREE. Fleetwood

INTERLUDE. More Tales from Daria Court

SECTION TWO. Touched: adjective, slightly unbalanced mentally CHAPTER FOUR. Hearthstone CHAPTER FIVE. Labay CHAPTER SIX. West Oaks at Cypress Creek INTERLUDE. Wrong Box, Wrong Body, Wrong Era INTERLUDE. Fairytales, Part 1: Beware the Witch’s Sugar House

CHAPTER SEVEN. Fairy Tales, Part 2: The Vampire Chronicles

SECTION THREE. Touched: transitive verb, move to sympathetic feeling, to leave a mark or impression on CHAPTER EIGHT. High Drama on the Northwest Freeway

CHAPTER NINE. Jim’s House in Montrose CHAPTER TEN. Railyard

INTERLUDE. Skid Marks INTERLUDE. Castilian Dormitory CHAPTER ELEVEN. Nob Hill

SECTION FOUR. Touch: noun, a distinctive method of dealing with something INTERLUDE. Phoenix Rising

CHAPTER TWELVE. Ain’t Nobody’s Biz INTERLUDE: Grindr

EPILOGUE

APPENDIX A. Reflecting on Method

APPENDIX B. Writing from a Phenomenological Perspective

APPENDIX C. Auditing CSA Memories

APPENDIX D. Theorizing CSA’s Feel-Good Paradox

APPENDIX E. Abuse’s Psychic Inscription

Über Autor(innen)

Ragan Fox is Professor of Communication Studies at California State University, Long Beach. The poet, scholar, and professor’s published works include Heterophobia (2005), Exile in Gayville (2009), and Inside Reality TV: Producing Race, Gender, and Sexuality on “Big Brother” (2018)—all of which explore queer identity and cultural politics.