How cisgender individuals learn which desires are acceptable, shameful, or invisible, and how intellectual inquiry becomes a way to reclaim forbidden wanting.
Sor Juana's intellectual passion reads as erotic desire redirected into acceptable channels—the love of learning becomes the love that can be publicly acknowledged. This concept explores how cisgender identity formation involves education into appropriate desire: which ambitions matter, which relationships are valid, which forms of pleasure deserve pursuit. Women socialized cisgender particularly experience desires being named as selfish, unfeminine, or threatening. Sor Juana's poetry reveals rich erotic and intellectual longing, asking us to consider whether these are truly separate or whether her scholarly passion provided socially acceptable expression for desires more broadly prohibited. For those examining cisgender identity, this framework invites honest questioning: What desires have I been taught to hide, diminish, or redirect? How might intellectual life, creative work, or other pursuits function as socially sanctioned outlets for desires I've learned are dangerous? Understanding the education of desire allows us to consciously choose which desires to honor and how to integrate them into our authentic identity rather than fragmenting ourselves across acceptable and forbidden selves.
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