Sex should be about having fun and pornography usually gets it wrong – at least according to Maerten Prins, long-time lecturer of the popular course Psychology of Sexuality.

In today’s episode of In a Nutshell, Antonia and Maerten talk about why the Netherlands might have the best sex education in the world but still falls short for many students. But what makes for good sex – and good sex education – in the first place? How has the way we talk about sex changed over the last decades? And why should we all masturbate more?

Maerten Prins is a cultural psychologist and lecturer in the Psychology department. His course Psychology of Sexuality is attended by more than 700 students every year and covers everything from coitus to consent, including Maerten’s favourite topic: pornography, which encompasses a whole range of things that need to be talked about when talking about sex.

To learn more about sex, follow Maerten’s tips and have a look at Justin Lehmiller’s book The Psychology of Human Sexuality, Lehmiller’s website and his Sex and Psychology Podcast. For Dutch readers, Maerten recommends the books De waarheid over seks: plezier en gendergelijkheid op planeet Aarde by Laan and van Lunsen and Seks!: een leven lang leren by van Lunsen en Laan. And for English readers, Emily Nagoski’s book Come As You Are.

Edit: Jara Majerus

Cover: Antonia Leise

How can sports be inclusive and exclusive at the same time? What can baseball tell us about Dutch colonialism? And how can sports be a means of identification?

In the first episode of 2025, Jara investigates the intersection of baseball and politics. Together with her guest Jan Bant, she explores notions of identity, belonging, and exclusion by taking a close look at what happens on the ball field.

Jan is a PhD candidate at the Department of History, Art History and Classics. He is interested in the past and present of colonialism, the Caribbean, and Transatlantic relations. For his PhD, he analyses baseball's role in Caribbean communities in the Netherlands and the Caribbean communities since 1950.

Do you want to know more about how baseball can teach us about colonialism, belonging and identity? Follow Jan’s tips and watch the documentary series "Homerun Curaçao" and the documentary "Boys of Summer". Or read "Honkbalgoud" by Maarten Kolsloot and Wesley Meijer.

Edit: Jara Majerus

Cover: Antonia Leise

How prominent is the male gaze in music reviews? Why are there no guilty pleasure songs? And how authentic can artists in an industry like the music industry really be?

In this episode, Antonia delves into the world of music, more specifically, music reviews. Together with her guest, Alex van der Hulst, she explores the shift from rockism to popism, asks whether we can separate artists from their art, and remembers iconic and extremely inauthentic pop groups (yes, it’s Milli Vanilli and Boney M.).

Alex van der Hulst is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Arts, where he researches popular music. His research focuses on how music reviews have shaped popular music and how they were shaped by it. Next to doing research, Alex also works as a journalist and is a writer of music reviews himself.

If you want to know more about music reviews and popular music, make sure to follow Alex’s suggestion and read or watch High Fidelity.

Edit: Jara Majerus

Cover: Antonia Leise