Considering the phenomenon of “nymphomania,” which has been popularly considered as female sexuality out of control, Groneman reviews the developments in the meaning of nymphomania throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Upon analyzing the understanding of nymphomania as reflective of the dominant culture's complex, the author sees nymphomania as similar to hysteria, neurasthenia, and other diseases of the nineteenth century. While the nineteenth century considered these illnesses to be organic, through the influence of Freud the twentieth century recognized them as largely mental disorders. In the case of nymphomania this meant a hypersexuality understood through various conceptions of female sexuality.