Naturism

Naturism, or nudism, is a cultural and political movement practising, advocating and defending personal and social nudity, most but not all of which takes place on private property. The term may also refer to a lifestyle based on personal, family and/or social nudism.

Naturism may take a number of forms. It may be practised individually, within a family, socially or in public. Additionally, there is also militant naturism, including campaigning and extreme naturism is sometimes considered a separate category.

The XIV Congress of the International Naturist Federation (Agde, France, 1974) defined naturism as:

Several other terms ("social nudity", "public nudity", "skinny dipping", "sunning", and "clothes-free") have been proposed as alternative terms for naturism, but none has found the same widespread public acceptance as the older terms "naturism" and (in much of the United States) "nudism".

People interested in social nudity can attend clothes-free beaches and other types of ad-hoc nudist events. At these venues, participants generally need not belong to a naturist club. An overlapping term to naturist with a similar definition includes birthday suiter.

Many contemporary naturists and naturist organisations feel that the practice of social nudity should be asexual. For various social, cultural, and historical reasons the lay public, the media, and many contemporary naturists and their organisations often oversimplify the relationship between naturism and sexuality. Current research has begun to explore this complex relationship.

The International Naturist Federation explains:

The usage and definition of these terms varies geographically and historically. Though in the United States, naturism and nudism have the same meaning, in Britain there is a clear distinction.

Nudism is the act of being naked, while naturism is a lifestyle which at various times embraced nature, environment, respect for others, self-respect, crafts, healthy eating, vegetarianism, teetotalism, non-smoking, yoga, physical exercise and pacifism as well as nudity.

In naturist parlance, or textilist is a non-naturist person, non-naturist behaviour or non-naturist facilities. e.g. the textile beach starts at the flag, they are a mixed couple – he is naturist, she is textile. Textile is the predominant term used in the UK ('textilist' is unknown in British naturist magazines including H&E naturist), although some naturists avoid it due to perceived negative or derogatory connotations. Textilist is said to be used interchangeably, but no dictionary definition to this effect exists, nor are there any equivalent examples of use in mainstream literature such as those for textile.Clothing optional and nude optional (US specific) describe a policy or a venue that allows or encourages nudity but tolerates the wearing of clothes. The opposite is clothing compulsory; that is, prohibiting nudity. Adjectival phrases clothes free and clothing free prescribe where naturism is permitted in an otherwise textile environment, or define the preferred state of a naturist.

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