The Ploy of InstinctIt is paradoxical that instinct became a central term for late Victorian sexual sciences as they were elaborated in the medicalized spaces of confession and introspection, given that instinct had long been defined in its opposition to self conscious thought. The Ploy of Instinct ties this paradox to instincts deployment in conceptualizing governmentality. Instincts domain, Frederickson argues, extended well beyond the women, workers, and savages to