Rethinking Alienation In Intimate Relationships: Recognition, Gendered Inequalities, and AI Intimacy In Contemporary Capitalism

Intimate relationships have become a central arena in which contemporary social transformations are lived, negotiated, and contested. While intimacy might be associated with autonomy, authenticity, and recognition, it is also shaped by marketization, digitalization, gendered inequalities, and new technological forms of relating. Experiences of loneliness, emotional distance, precarious sexual relationships, and emerging forms of AI intimacy raise new questions about alienation in contemporary capitalism.

This session invites theoretical and empirical contributions that explore alienation in intimate life from a broad range of sociological perspectives. We are particularly interested in papers examining how intimate relationships reproduce, challenge, or transform inequalities and contradictions related to capitalist forms of social organization. Possible topics include, but are not limited to: gendered asymmetries in care and emotional labour; insufficient recognition and struggles for authenticity; dating cultures and digital intimacy; sexuality, desire, and commodification; loneliness and social isolation; AI companions and human–machine intimacy; changing family forms; social reproduction; queer and intersectional perspectives on intimacy; critical theory, and emotions.

We especially welcome paper presentations that engage with alienation as a sociological and critical concept. By bringing together research on intimacy, gender, emotions, technology, and capitalism, the session aims to foster dialogue across sociological subfields and to advance our understanding of intimate relationships as a key site of both domination and emancipation.

This is an open session, allowing for 15 to 20 minutes per presentation.