A brief academic but tongue-in-cheek look at covering women's bodies in the arts.
From raids & arrests, interviews with living burlesque legends, to current common blue laws & including FOSTA/SESTA effecting artists online.
Historians and literature often discuss the struggles of fashionably brave women, showgirls, & sex workers with glazed over eyes and hushed voices, easily digested and forgotten. If it's too scandalous it is giggled at then rushed over quickly. But never has it actually included sex workers voices.
It's time to diversify the narrative.
If you love burlesque, vaudeville, history, or stripclubs & bikinis, then you need to know the (frustrating) history of how we know them today.
Articles from press and police archives document throughout history that women's bodies in the arts and sports industries were regularly policed heavily compared to their male counterparts.
"Another feminist history book about women's lewdness?!"
Yes but this time, it's by us, for us. Sex Workers & Showgirls voices and experiences will give a more accurate narrative, a saucier tale to tell of fearlessness and sparkle.
Any and all research and transcripts associated with the historical research that created this book will also be donated to archives and curators of museums whose mission statements will best fit preserving this history in multiple cities the research is associated with. Museums with sex positive and sex worker positive and inclusive mission statements.
