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Thread: Doing my undergrad thesis on StripperWeb

  1. #1
    Member AnthroGirl's Avatar
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    Default Doing my undergrad thesis on StripperWeb

    Hi StripperWeb,

    I'm AnthroGirl, I've been visiting StripperWeb occasionally for about 6 years, just basically coming here when I need info but never posting anything. I'm 29 and I've been dancing since I was 18-- mostly in clubs, but right now I'm a camgirl.

    I'm currently working towards a Bachelors' in Anthropology (I graduate in June) and right now I'm doing a 'Senior Honors Thesis', where I have to do a mini-ethnography (only a couple months, instead of the customary year). I would like to my ethnography here.

    I'm interested in StripperWeb because I always found dressing room talk super fascinating. Since it would be untenable for strippers to have the exact same sexual norms as mainstream society and still be able to function, it seems to me that dressing room talk was often about, explicitly or subtextually, discussing and redefining the limits of respectable sexuality amongst ourselves. And of course it's never once and for all settled--it's constantly being contested and negotiated. And while there are myriad individual experiences and motivations, I feel like 've noticed several discernable factions and philosophies when it comes to strippers on stripping. Of course, i'm open to being totally wrong about that.

    But for instance, I've met ladies who are like, into tantra, who felt like "priestessing sexual energy" was their calling and that they do their job from the heart, and then I've met women who see themselves as professional hustlers, who are "getting over" on a weak and pathetic clientele. I've met people who used feminist academic language to articulate their position, and people who use hip hop terminology, (and people who use both) and people who've made it clear that they're actually pretty traditional but the only reason they're in this job is because they have mouths to feed. Clearly there's no generalizing why someone strips and how they feel about it, but at the same time I do believe that in those dressing room talks, subcultural norms do get created and enforced (but never wholesale adopted by everyone at all times) Like for instance, amongst the group who I'll call "hustlers," they'd suck their teeth at any girl who mentioned finding a customer attractive, and say "ew" and look at each other disdainfully-- that's norm-enforcement right there.

    For me, as a stripper, I haven't settled on how I feel about "being a stripper". I guess that's why I'm writing this paper. And I'm sure there are plenty of others like me, too--who aren't sure, who see it several ways.

    And then to complicate things, StripperWeb is obviously different from dressing room conversation in strip clubs, even though they are both "strippers talking to each other about the job." I'd like to get a feel for how the online format makes that conversation different, and then also how having an online community to share with and vent to changes the experience of the job, and dealing with stigma, and etc. So I've got lots of interesting questions, and they'll be answered by asking you guys what you think and what your ideas and impressions are.
    The thesis statement of my paper is not going to be a generalizing conclusion, but a statement about how diverse the conversation is.

    So I hope you all will like it, and hopefully let me interview you. Of course, if you do not want to participate, here are the nuts and bolts:

    I won't be using any information that is not already publicly available without your express permission. If I do interview you, I will ask your permission to use your quotes, and nothing you tell me during the interview will be attributed to your username in my paper or anywhere else. In fact, I won't be putting any usernames in my paper at all, even the ones associated with quotes taken from the public board (I'm just trying to be extra safe with confidentiality.)

    And if you're worried about SW getting 'publicity' from this-- don't be. This is an undergraduate thesis, and not a proper ethnography, being only 2 months of 'participant observation'--it's basically just practice. It'll get published in an under-the-radar undergrad honors thesis magazine and promptly forgotten and ignored, and i'll give a presentation to other undergrads who have done similar projects. I don't have enough time or academic clout for this to call attention to SW.

    Anyway-- I'm excited. Please PM me if I can interview you, or if you have any ideas to share. And please let me know in this thread or PM if you have any concerns or advice for me when doing this work so that I can be maximally respectful to this community.

    Let me know what you think.

    Sincerely,

    AnthroGirl

    (PS. if you want to know a bit more about me personally, here's my intro thread: http://www.stripperweb.com/forum/sho...-honors-thesis )

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  3. #2
    Member vickytoria's Avatar
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    Default Re: Doing my undergrad thesis on StripperWeb

    That's awesome!! I'm a psych major, i'm only p/t in my second year and I've read a few biohgraphical books on the subject (candy girl, and ivy league stripper if youre interested) and toying with the idea of writing one of my own.

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  5. #3
    God/dess Sophia_Starina's Avatar
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    Default Re: Doing my undergrad thesis on StripperWeb

    Quote Originally Posted by AnthroGirl View Post
    Like for instance, amongst the group who I'll call "hustlers," they'd suck their teeth at any girl who mentioned finding a customer attractive, and say "ew" and look at each other disdainfully-- that's norm-enforcement right there.

    I think you're generalizing a little broadly. Perhaps they (the group you've defined as the "hustlers") have had experiences with that customer and have come to find that particular customer disdainful. Perhaps that small group is like-minded in their "strictly business" approach. They could be lesbians (I've worked with homosexual dancers that have done similar things, and yeah they have a tendency to group-up). They could just be disagreeing with the dancer. They could be using a clique mentality to make the dancer uneasy (more like competition, less like norm-enforcement).

    Interestingly enough, established dancers, at times, have a tendency to be obtrusive in sharing their opinion on how dancers should/shouldn't work, feel, and act. That will vary from club to club, state to state, region to region.

    I'm unsure how that makes those women "hustlers". Hustling is, in my opinion, defined by getting money through different approaches. I feel it is defined by keeping the eyes on the prize and adapting to the customer, the situation, and unabashedly switching gears in order to sell dances, rooms, etc.

    More importantly, hustlers wouldn't be spending time formulating and expressing opinions in regard to another dancer being attracted to a customer. Hustlers are often the first on the floor and last out the door or in a VIP room, of course. Hustlers tend toward the self-centered side of the spectrum. Anything other dancers say is usually interpreted as radio static unless it pertains to monetary opportunity or to them. Don't get me wrong, I've been trying to become more single-minded and drown out all the jibber-jabber to focus on the task at hand.

    If you'd like to interview me, I'd be game. I'm not exactly clear on your thesis/premise. Can you please clarify what the point of your paper is and what you're trying to do?
    Quote Originally Posted by Jay12 View Post
    ^What Sophia said.
    Quote Originally Posted by yoda57us View Post
    I wish there was an "auto-like" setting that I could just have applied to all of your posts Sophia....

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  7. #4
    Member AnthroGirl's Avatar
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    Default Re: Doing my undergrad thesis on StripperWeb

    Hi Vickytoria-- what is p/t?
    I haven't read any strip autobiographies, though I want to. I've read lots of excerpts and accounts in different feminist/anthro collections, but no entire biographies written by one person. Ivy league stripper looks totally useful to the research I'm doing now, thanks for the recommendation! Also it seems super inspiring. Jeez, I would like to go to Brown.
    And I'm interested in how you'd write your strip autobiography-- how would you frame it? What's the overall story arch?

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    Member AnthroGirl's Avatar
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    Default Re: Doing my undergrad thesis on StripperWeb

    Hi Sophia! Thank you for offering me such insightful feedback. I think you've definitely hit on something that I've already stumbled over-- I'm new at this, and thank you helping me in my learning process-- that making names for things, like patterns I see, or groups of people that I've met-- is a dangerous and often unnecessary thing to do, that can cause poor communication at best or implicit stereotyping at worst, and should not be done lightly.
    This mentality I was talking about before, that I clumsily called "hustler," is definitely not typical of all strippers, although I have found this mentality in more than one group of girls, in more than one club that i've worked at. And although the girls I was talking about would identify themselves and their approach to stripping as being "hustlers", they are definitely not the only people who would call themselves that: you don't have to have the same mentality as those girls to think of yourself as a hustler. So let's scrap that-- let me just say that I've encountered a certain crystallized and well fleshed-out mentality in certain cliques at several stripclubs. Some of these girls are my close friends-- so my understanding of their philosophy isn't based on a few incidental conversations I've overheard (or misunderstood). Girls have broken down for me exactly what their approach is, which is, to put it broadly--men who pay for women's attention are marks, losers, etc; and taking them for all they've got is a point of pride. So.. if a man who comes into a club to give a girl money is a loser, with no self-respect or whatever, then there's something wrong with any girl who dates customers, or finds them attractive, or says her work is "fun." The girls who I've known who think like this also bare the traits of a hustler you listed-- they work all the time, they're the first to get on the floor, and the last to leave. But, they're not the only ones who do that: there are girls who hustle just as hard without having axiomatic contempt for customers.
    Anyway-- this is just one example of one particular set of ideas i've seen kicking around in the stripclub dressing room in my 10 years (off and on) dancing. It's definitely not the majority mentality! Just an example of one discernible pattern that i've seen. And I'm sure there's plenty of people (like me) who don't subscribe to any one philosophy, either, and are just making it up as they go along.

    Quote Originally Posted by Sophia_Starina View Post
    Interestingly enough, established dancers, at times, have a tendency to be obtrusive in sharing their opinion on how dancers should/shouldn't work, feel, and act. That will vary from club to club, state to state, region to region.
    Yes, absolutely-- this is one of the things I'm interested in. I'm also interested in the times when "how dancers should/shouldn't work" becomes more than just one person's opinion. Like for instance-- here's some obvious ones: don't undercut prices, and don't go further than other dancers, than what is usual in that particular club. This is a very practical and useful norm for sure, it doesn't have to be "bad" to be a norm. But it gets broken all the time, and it also gets enforced-- I know I'm not the only one who's overheard loud, agro complaining about "cheap bitches" in the dressing room.

    Quote Originally Posted by Sophia_Starina View Post
    If you'd like to interview me, I'd be game. I'm not exactly clear on your thesis/premise. Can you please clarify what the point of your paper is and what you're trying to do?
    Hooray! I will inbox you-- thank you so much. And I am absolutely open to/grateful for critiquing too

    As for my thesis-- well, this is an ethnography, so I'm not trying to prove a pre-formulated point. Rather, I'm supposed to hang out and see what there is to see, and then formulate a thesis from there. But so far my main ideas are that 1) there's a tension between mainstream society's sexual norms and being a stripper. Strippers are seen as exotic, transgressive, dirty, desireable, etc-- but not 'normal'. I don't know of any other legal line of work that you'd work in 10 years and not be able to put on your resume. 2) in response to this pressure, strippers redefine the boundaries of what is 'respectable' sexuality for themselves through discourse--which includes discussion, behavior, habits, etc 3) number three is more like a question: how does having an online community of supportive but diverse experiences and opinions on stripping affect this process (the process of redefining sexual norms)? How does it affect the feelings of stigma, and the socioeconomic impact of stigma too (for instance, I've found the threads on saving money and transitioning to other jobs really really helpful. One of the worst parts of stripper stigma for me is around getting a job outside of the industry, what do i put on my resume, etc)

    I guess the answer I'm expecting to find is "it's really awesome" or "it really helps." lol.

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