Phallacy: Life Lessons from the Animal Penis

Product Description

A wry look at what the astonishing world of animal penises can tell us about how we use our own.

The fallacy sold to many of us is that the penis signals dominance and power. But this wry and penetrating book reveals that in fact nature did not shape the penis–or the human attached to it–to have the upper…hand.

Phallacy looks closely at some of nature’s more remarkable examples of penises and the many lessons to learn from them. In tracing how we ended up positioning our nondescript penis as a pulsing, awe-inspiring shaft of all masculinity and human dominance,
Phallacy also shows what can we do to put that penis back where it belongs.

Emphasizing our human capacities for impulse control,
Phallacy ultimately challenges the toxic message that the penis makes the man and the man can’t control himself. With instructive illustrations of unusual genitalia and tales of animal mating rituals that will make you particularly happy you are not a bedbug,
Phallacy shows where humans fit on the continuum from fun to fatal phalli and why the human penis is an implement for intimacy, not intimidation.

Review

“If you like did-you-know books, and your tastes run a little outré, then PHALLACY is worth a look…Ms. Willingham has written an amusing book, willing to tackle pressing issues.”
-The Wall Street Journal

“Amid all the awe–exploding sperm packages, prehensile penises, pheromone war–Willingham makes a big point –entertainingly, smartly, and expertly.” –
Wired, on their list of best science books of Winter 2020

“Willingham takes readers on a historical, evolutionary and often hilarious tour of the penises of the planet. ‘Nothing gets clicks like a story about dicks,’ she writes. ‘Even if it’s about a penis that’s 1.5 millimeters long and millions of years old.’ Along the way, she puts the human penis into much-needed perspective.” 
-Science News

“… a thorough stroll through this portion of the biological world … [Willingham] says human genitals aren’t the most important organs when it comes to copulation. Rather, she writes, it’s the human mind that ‘deserves to be re-centered as the most fundamental element of our sexual behaviors.’–
New York Post

“This is a hilarious tour through a menagerie of dicks, and a ferocious guide to not being a dick yourself.”–
Ed Yong, New York Times Bestselling Author of I Contain Multitudes
 
“PHALLACY is both smart and smart-ass, serious and startling–and it will make you reconsider your ideas about sexual balance of power in ways both satisfying and important.”–
Deborah Blum, Pulitzer Prize Winning Author of The New York Times Bestselling Author of The Poison Squad
 

“Exuberantly witty and scathingly subversive, Willingham’s 
PHALLACY 
takes a long-overdue look at the myriad ways that putting the penis, and maleness in general, at center stage have skewed many fields of scientific inquiry, from the study of evolution to Freud’s fulminations on psychoanalysis. An important and timely book.” 
–Steve Silberman, New York Times Bestselling Author of NeuroTribes

“Emily Willingham’s wonderful book is both a hilarious tour of many bizarre natural wonders and a ferocious corrective for many toxic cultural myths. I lost track of how often I laughed, and how much I learned
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Ed Yong, New York Times bestselling author of I Contain Multitudes

“PHALLACY is Dr. Emily Willingham’s detailed, insightful, and funny cross-species biography of the penis. It’s an entertaining romp that is as much about evolution as it is about emotion and egos. It shines a light on how we became so penis-centric and the resulting repercussions for science, society, and sex.” —
Jen Gunter, MD, New York Times Bestselling Author of The Vagina Bible

“PHALLACY plunges readers into the wild and wacky world of animal genitalia while exploring the social and cultural significance of penises as symbols of power and identity.”–Smithsonian Magazine