tuscl

Academic studies of strip clubs

Thursday, September 28, 2006 11:21 PM
I once said that "some one" should do a serious study of strip clubs...perhaps from the viewpoint of psychology or sociology. A little time on the Intenet shows that MANY people have done such studies...there are numerous papers by doctoral candidates and junior faculty members in social sciences studying our favorite hobby. A review of these paper shows that women authors have the advantage, as going "undercover" as a dancer is so common as almost to be required, and is perhaps even a little trite. The interesting thing about these papers is how many of them are written from the viewpoint of "isn't it interesting that men will spend so much time and money on an encounter with a woman that doesn't involve sexual satisfaction?" The studies could have been written by any number of regulars on the Pink Site. I suppose that this is, in part, of function of the number of female academics writing these papers as an "undercover investigator." If you are a 20/30 something graduate student or assistant professor, you certainly aren't going to submit a paper saying that you spent your sabbatical giving hand jobs in a strip club, and here is what you learned from it. But the overall tone of these studies is quite naive, from my point of view.

6 comments

  • chitownlawyer
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    18 years ago
    The following resulted from about three minutes' searching on [view link]. Perhaps they will be edifying. [view link] [view link] [view link] [view link] [view link]
  • AbbieNormal
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    18 years ago
    I've always been a little mystified that people (mostly women) seem to need to ask why men go to strip clubs. I mean they know that there are naked women there, right?
  • OkDude
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    18 years ago
    chitownlawyer can you post a link for some of these academic studies of strip clubs?
  • Book Guy
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    18 years ago
    Plenty of "studies" of the sex and sex-related industries are out there. Unfortunately, most are politically correct "empowerment" diatribes in which the investigator has an agenda -- generally, either (a) deriding male customers and the "commodification" of females or (b) exhorting how women have taken up arms in a sort of "I'm proud of how I wield power" statement about a certain episode. Mostly, they're devoid of stats and true information, full of interpretation and self-aggandizement, and written not by sociologists, economists, or even anthropologists, but instead by Marxists in comparative literature or education departments. Almost inevitably there's a closing chapter on the "meaningfulness" that the author found in undertaking this study, and how she (yes, always she) came to more fully "understand her own power." The left-wing knee-jerk authors of these fake navel-gazings quickly come to the conclusion that males engaged in sexuality, particularly as related to economics, are evil and downright sub-human for merely LOOKING at hot women. This ironically means that the lefties agree entirely with Christian fundamentalilst Bible thumpers.
  • FONDL
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    18 years ago
    In this, as well as many other fields, the authors start with a preconceived notion and then set out to "prove" it. Any evidence that conflicts with their view is ignored. That's pretty standard procedure. You can prove almost anything that way.
  • parodyman-->
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    18 years ago
    This seems to be a recurring theme in the academic world, doing a bullshit study on a subject that the author can never truly understand because the author cannot give him or her self over to the experience completely.
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