I have been studying it [sexuality] since before it became fashionable. At the Yale Grad School, for example, where I was from 1968 to 1972, I was literally the only person in the humanities departments doing a dissertation on sex — hard to believe now, but I was a real pioneer and I took the career hit for it. It was considered tacky, low, not serious — my dears, I was absolutely scouring the Yale archives for every bit of dirt on homosexuality, sadomasochism, transvestism — you name it. That is the basis of the research for my first book, Sexual Personae, which was my dissertation.
When asked "why you write about sex?" Paglia on AOL (11 September 1996)