Sex at Dawn

How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships

By: Christopher Ryan, Cacilda Jetha

Narrated by: Allyson Johnson, Jonathan Davis, Christopher Ryan (Preface)

Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins

Publisher's summary

Earphones Award Winner (AudioFile Magazine)

Since Darwin's day, we've been told that sexual monogamy comes naturally to our species. Mainstream science - as well as religious and cultural institutions - has maintained that men and women evolved in families in which a man's possessions and protection were exchanged for a woman's fertility and fidelity. But this narrative is collapsing. Fewer and fewer couples are getting married, and divorce rates keep climbing as adultery and flagging libido drag down even seemingly solid marriages.

How can reality be reconciled with the accepted narrative? It can't be, according to renegade thinkers Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jetha. While debunking almost everything we "know" about sex, they offer a bold alternative explanation in this provocative and brilliant book.

Ryan and Jetha's central contention is that human beings evolved in egalitarian groups that shared food, child care, and, often, sexual partners. Weaving together convergent, frequently overlooked evidence from anthropology, archaeology, primatology, anatomy, and psychosexuality, the authors show how far from human nature monogamy really is. Human beings everywhere and in every era have confronted the same familiar, intimate situations in surprisingly different ways. The authors expose the ancient roots of human sexuality while pointing toward a more optimistic future illuminated by our innate capacities for love, cooperation, and generosity.

BONUS AUDIO: Includes a Preface written and read by author Christopher Ryan.

©2010 Christopher Ryan, Cacilda Jetha (P)2010 Audible, Inc

Critic reviews

"A surprisingly non-titillating book about sex among prehistoric people makes for a terrific audio adaptation...With their straightforward approach, the narrators show professionalism and authority in this anthropological discussion of sex." ( AudioFile)

“ Sex at Dawn is the single most important book about human sexuality since Alfred Kinsey unleashed Sexual Behavior in the Human Male on the American public in 1948.” (Dan Savage)

"My favorite book of 2010...it's the only book I read this year that proved that I was badly mistaken about something." (Peter Sagal, host of NPR's Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!)

changed my life perspective

this book gave me peace about elephant in the room questions I'd had about sex and relationships

Hilarious. Helpful! Eye-opening!

I laughed hard and often. Many times evoking a "what's so funny" look from my coworkers. This really made sense to me and helped me process a lot of what I have been going through.

Truths against institutionalized sexuality

loved it it was funny intelligent gave Wonderful's citations and I even read some of the footnotes and and reviewed some of the further information online

I learned a lot

It was a good listen and very educational. Might not be a good listen for the uptight or ultra-conservative.

Must Read

This book shows just how recent, peculiar, and unnatural the idea of monogamous marriage really is. Read, recommend, and let’s end the centuries of illusion and suffering. Bring on the new era :)

awesome sauce

this is a really insightful book both humorous and educational. the efforts gone to scientifically and rigorously disprove deeply held and incorrect myths about the human creature is appreciated

Amazing content

One of the most interesting and concise books on the subject of human sexuality, it’s history, and examples of things that work and those that don’t.

The science and studies that were done to support the subject.

I found this book a must read for any adult at any age. It makes so much sense and explains so many problems and misinformation regarding sex. I wish I’d read this book as a teenager. I’m 72 and I feel like I could’ve had better relationshipsand enjoyed sex so much more than I have until now.

**REQUIRED READING**

Where was this book when I was a teenager? Why was this not the backbone of SexEd? It is a crime against humanity that these aspects of human sexuality are not widely shared and understood!

My whole sexual adult life I’ve felt kind of like Neo in The Matrix or some freakish social deviant, just for consistently wanting and desiring sexual truths or realities, which were treated as evil or amoral or unhealthy. This book is the first time in my life someone with a rational and scientific trove of evidence has basically said, “what you think and feel and desire is totally normal and healthy - you’re a healthy human being.”

We have so much work to do on society and on ourselves to undo what has been so perverted and broken by centuries of patriarchal agrarianism. But, thank you so much to these authors for having the courage to explore the truth with humility and scientific incisiveness. Truly, thank you!

Thought provoking

Thought provoking book that promises a very different landscape for our relationships, the way we live and raise children.

Amazing and courageous work!