First and foremost, society is made up of a vast array of communities and experiences—and though you don’t have to like them all, all of them are significant pieces comprising the whole of humanity. As such, all of them are worthy of respectful consideration. Further, whether it concerns the content of a film or a trip to Las Vegas, no two people will ever experience the same thing in the same way. And though we all technically “know” this, the trick is to remain mindful of that fact. Another trick to strive for is the balance between critical (when necessary) and empowering (wherever possible)—no one needs a constant killjoy or a total hater, and a tendency to only identify and/or focus on the negative helps no one.
Finally, there is no authority more correct than your own informed perspective. Every single one of us is human, thus subjective and biased. And though insights and contributions from others are a significant part of what makes the world go ‘round, no amount of education or degrees can ever rid an individual of bias. Consequently, you must consider the source and the motives guiding every situation, every insight, and every piece of advice.
When I first began this work, my desires to needle people and push social boundaries were significant motivating factors. (Let’s be honest: They were the biggest motivating factors.) But as time passed and I grew as a person, both from learning about the adult community and maturing as a human, my endeavors became more about uplifting social justice than anything else—social justice for a community of people who are ultimately no different from you or me. It’s ironic, though, that my work seemed to become more irksome to the powers that be as its true purpose shifted to something that was allegedly more in-line with what a large measure of scholarship seeks to achieve.
I’ve been asked many times, in many different ways, whether, if I knew then what I know now, I would do anything differently in terms of my academic arc. And though I honestly didn’t have anything close to a clear concept of how difficult this journey would be at the outset, I can tell you without hesitation that I’d do it all over again.
Sure, knowing how insurmountable my endeavors would occasionally seem might have been helpful. But knowing that the same ridiculous social and institutional bulwarks would be present, no matter who or what I was, well, that might have helped even more. At least then I would have known my presence within this entire series of difficulties was more incidental than consequential. Our world behaves toward porn the way it behaves toward porn, regardless of my presence or involvement. Perhaps understanding this inevitability would simply have made me push harder, sooner. Had I embraced earlier what was ultimately happening anyway, maybe my quest to change the world would be further along.
Which brings me to my even grander, loftier takeaway point for you, dear reader. Fight. Push. And, if your intentions are even remotely pure, don’t worry about what other people say. Our larger social institutions are invested in the status quo, as the status quo is what ensures their continued survival. There are many different ways to topple the system, all at once and bit by bit, and there are many different systems that need shaking up. And sometimes, just the idea of fucking with someone or something makes said shake-ups alluring. (At least, it does for me.) But if you’re as lucky as I’ve been—so lucky as to stumble upon a puzzle that truly moves you, for the better—then fight to solve it. And don’t give up. Change will eventually come, I promise.
Author’s Note
THERE ARE SEVERAL PILLARS WHO HAVE ANCHORED AND shaped me throughout various stages of this process—BCFJ; my parents and brothers; inspirational women MMC, Joy King, AIR, and Jane Prather; my FAM fam, especially Adella and Chris; and my team at Greenleaf, who were able to see Exposure, rather than the exposé everyone else seemed to want. Thank you, each and every one.
I would be remiss if did not also mention Christal, Nanciful, LBQ, CER, JZ, Jacky, Lydia, Tracey, Patricia, Asha, Diana, Hailey, DEC, and Nate—the dearest of friends who have put up with my nonsense for a long, long (long) time—as well as RB and TJ for making everything fun, always. Many thanks are also due AVN, XBIZ, IAFD (without which, I could do nothing), the Gender and Sexuality Center at UT, the Sociology Department at CSUN (2000–2003), FSC, YNOT, TRPWL, and Adult DVD Empire. I am grateful for mentorship, friendship, and leadership from Gram Ponante, Angie and Colin Rowntree, Steve Orenstein, Mark Kernes, Brian Alexander, Dan O’Connell and Moose, Ken Herskovitz, Don Houston, Lynn Swanson, Kerry Ferris, Karen Tynan, Allison Vivas, Theresa Flynt, Barbara Collins, and Christian Mann, who will always be here to remind me of the difference a single life can make.
And there are so many more, thousands more. Over the years, there have been so many kind and brilliant people who have helped me in countless huge and/or subtle ways. Some, I’m still in daily contact with, but others have moved on or away, out of the adult industry, sociology, and/or my consciousness. This, however, in no way renders their part in this process any less significant, and I never want to forget. Thus, rather than continuing this litany of name-drops: If we’ve ever communicated, spoken or otherwise, thank you. You have helped shape my thinking in a meaningful way. If you’ve ever inspired me, directly or by proxy of your own unique badassery, thank you. You, too, have helped shape my thinking in a meaningful way. And if you’ve ever looked at me or my work and wondered some form of “What the hell? No.”—well, I actually thank you most of all.
—CT
Notes
Chapter 1. How Did a Nice Girl Like You Get into (Studying) Porn?
1. My understanding of habitus comes from Pierre Bourdieu’s Distinction (1984). Habitus is basically your taste—your likes and dislikes and what feels “normal” to you. Your ideas about what’s a good joke and what sounds fun to do on a Friday night are part of your habitus, among many other things.
Habitus develops over time and, thus, may change. Your favorite music as a kid might not be the same when you’re a teen. You may be an adventurous low-budget traveler in your twenties, but in your thirties you may want a guided tour and a nice hotel. Habitus also has a social component in the sense that taste can be a marker of social class. For example, a preferred snack of pretzels and beer says something different than a preferred snack of hummus and kombucha. Kicking back and watching TV in your free time says something different than volunteering at an animal shelter (assuming you have free time in the first place).
In academic speak, habitus is isomorphic to the social structural conditions in which it emerges. It matches where it comes from. So although it can change and develop over time, individual habitus marks and places a person within the context of wider society, including social hierarchies. This part of habitus is not objective or nice, but it does exist in the world we’ve created.
In the context of the wider society, my habitus is not exactly “classy.” This caused a lot of problems for me in graduate school, a space that fancies itself as very classy indeed.
2. Methods and methodology are a significant in any sort of research, and all researchers should be forthcoming with whatever it is that they did to determine their findings. This is important for at least two reasons. First, it lets others possibly replicate a study. Second, it lets people know exactly where your work is coming from. Not sharing a sampling frame (and similar failings in disclosure) or making sweeping generalizations on the basis of unrepresentative data, for example, are indicative of poor scholarship. These things are also antithetical to feminist-informed research principles.
3. Ethnography is like people-watching with a plan. The goal is to watch long enough and often enough such that you can figure out the meanings of ordinary activities. An ethnographer watches, sometimes gets involved (this is called participant observation), and always takes lots of notes. Eventually, they may be able to figure out some patterns.
For my master’s thesis at CSUN, I watched and waited tables in two restaurants: one super corporate and one family owned and informal. I wrote up some of my findings in “Doing Gender as Resistance: Waitresses and Servers in Contemporary T
able Service” in the Journal of Contemporary Ethnography (2007, volume 36).
4. Funding can make or break a graduate student very quickly. For most programs at top-level research universities, a funding package consists of a full tuition waiver; a teaching assistant (TA) or research assistant (RA) position, which comes with a monthly stipend (which varies by region and program, but it was about $1,400 per month when I was in graduate school at UT); full health insurance benefits; office space; and office perks (printing, copying, supplies, etc).
Departmental funding is based on evaluations of students by faculty. Supposedly, faculty assess students’ progress annually through the duration of the program, but their actual assessments and the ins and outs of the process are kept private. Students do not get to see how they are being evaluated, nor are they given feedback to make improvements. Further, professors are asked to state how well they know an individual student at the outset of each assessment. A professor’s assessment is then weighted on the basis of the perceived student-teacher relationship. Assessments from professors who claim to know students more closely are given greater weight, so students are advised to make good impressions on key faculty.
Without funding, or at least an in-state tuition waiver (which drops your tuition rate considerably), a graduate student’s costs add up quickly.
During my time at UT, a full term of units, which you must be enrolled in every semester regardless of whether you were actually taking classes (while writing your dissertation, you can enroll in “dissertation hours,” which are basically space-keeper units and involve no actual class time but cost the same), cost approximately $3,000 for in-state tuition and $6,000 for out-of-state tuition. It took me six total years (or twelve semesters) to complete my PhD, and I lost my funding after my first year. Because I was not from Texas, unless I managed to secure some form of external funding, I had to pay tuition at the out-of-state rate.
5. The following summarizes my two hundred-plus-page dissertation project. Enjoy!
Women work in the adult industry as performers and in a variety of behind-the-scenes occupations and executive roles. But, as would be expected, women were not always integrated into every level of the adult industry. The process of integration occurred over time, just as it did in myriad other workplaces; however, unlike many other workplaces, neither advocacy from an external social movement nor activism from workers within the industry initiated this integration. My dissertation research explored the following two questions: First, how has women’s incorporation and opportunities for participation in the United States’ adult film industry changed since the 1950s? Second, how has the content of adult films changed since the 1950s?
The evidence I found suggested that women’s labor incorporation and opportunities for participation expanded internally, from the top down. Company owners, film producers, and powerful industry leaders began expanding women’s rights, and thus, partially, their incorporation into the workplace, in response to legal and cultural pressures from regulators and industry-wide structural changes occurring during the late 1970s and early 1980s.
Regarding the processes responsible for these developments: In a nutshell, the development of the adult industry over the years has been shaped by dynamic multidimensional tensions among producers, consumers, and regulators. These tensions are partially reflected in the content of key adult films. The historical development of the industry has led to the emergence of a closely interconnected occupational network. This network and what I call “industry protective practices”—endeavors initiated by adult industry business leaders, owners, and producers that protect both the welfare of workers and the industry itself—operate synergistically and are responsible for the top-down expansion of women workers’ labor rights and opportunities over time. Industry leaders and business owners employ industry protective practices to sustain the social network and as strategic measures to avoid regulation and scrutiny from entities outside the adult industry.
6. “Writing grants” are exactly what they sound like: sizable chunks of money intended to support a student who is writing up research. Students with a substantial writing grant may spend their days overwhelmed by the task at hand and/or freaking out about a life that often feels both out-of-control and directionless; but ultimately, all they have to do is . . . type.
Chapter 3. Watching Porn for Science
1. See my work “From The Devil in Miss Jones to DMJ6: Power, Inequality, and Consistency in the Content of US Adult Films” in Sexualities 13 (2010) for a detailed rendering of this entire study.
Chapter 4. Working the Booth
1. RealDolls are designed to mimic the appearance, texture, and weight of the human form. An average RealDoll costs about $6,000 and is completely customizable, with a pose-able PVC skeleton and silicone flesh. They require regular maintenance and upkeep.
A doll’s primary function is to serve as its owner’s sex partner; however, these ladies are so real that they often work their way into a person’s entire life, psyche, and emotions. RealDolls often become companions.
Chapter 8. Academic Snubbery
1. At the time, in the sociology department at UT, $500 was the maximum annual travel allowance for graduate students.
Chapter 9. The Slippery Slope of Subjectivity
1. E-mail correspondence, quoted with permission.
Chapter 10. “Tranny,” Queer, and Tales of Loaded Language
1. Passage quoted from early versions of my work “Gonzo, Trannys, and Teens—Current Trends in United States’ Adult Content Production, Distribution, and Consumption” in Porn Studies 1, no. 1–2 (2014).
2. First named by legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw, intersectionality is the study of the intersections occurring between wider social systems of oppression, domination, and discrimination. For example, in black feminist theory, it is understood that experiences of race and gender are not independent, thus should not be considered as such. What happens at the junctures between race and gender (as well as any combination of age, ethnicity, able-bodiedness, sexual orientation, global positionality, social class, etc.) is unique, often synergistic, and always significant.
3. See note 1 for reference.
4. E-mail correspondence, quoted with permission.
5. It’s worth noting that the “Tranny Awards” are now known as the Transgender Erotica Awards (or, the TEAs). Organizers Grooby Entertainment changed the name in early 2014 for the event’s seventh annual gala. According to Grooby Entertainment CEO Steven Grooby (via press release), the original name was no longer appropriate. “Tranny” had ceased to convey the lighthearted tenor they had originally intended and was insufficiently inclusive.
In terms of sociology and social justice, I confess that I was really, really happy when I learned about this name change. Plus the TEAs—which is a fun play on the T in LGBTQ and the word “tease,” as in a sexy tease—is super cute!
Chapter 11. Pegging: The Oldest New Trick in the Book
1. See Chapter 3, note 1.
2. Heteronormativity is a worldview that promotes heterosexuality as the “normal” or preferred sexual orientation.
Chapter 12. Beyond Porn Funk
1. Jean Baudrillard’s Simulacra and Simulation (1981) calls the relationships existing among and between reality, symbols, and society into question. Simulacra are copies (of copies of copies, etc.) that depict things that either had no reality to begin with or that no longer have an original. Baudrillard discusses casinos in Las Vegas as the ultimate simulacra—imitations of cities (for example, New York or Paris) that reflect a popular imagination of what something is or was, versus what actually is or may have been.
People’s bow-chicka-bow-wowing of porn is a simulacrum, both of adult content (classic and contemporary) as well as funk music in general.
Chapter 14. Being a Guy in Porn Is (Not) Hard
1. A mope is a low-prestige class of adult performer. Mopes generally add numbers to large gangbang scenes and are very rarely cr
edited beyond “Guy #X,” etc.
Chapter 15. Match Mates
1. Gonzo is a film form that incorporates the use of a “talking camera,” where the person capturing a particular sequence or scene is also playing an active, integral role in the on-screen action. For example, in porn, a person may be holding the camera while giving directions or making comments to people performing in a sex scene. Gonzo form content can be found in all genres and sub-genres of porn.
2. You may be wondering why I’m masking Kelle’s and Ms. X’s identities here, but not Manuel’s. Well, pretty much every performer I know wants to work with Manuel Ferrara, for the first time or the tenth. And he works all the time. So though Kelle is both singular and special, her lust for Manuel is not. In this respect, she could be anyone.
Chapter 16. The Real Linda Lovelace (née Boreman, née Marchiano)
1. See “The Real Linda Lovelace” in Gloria Steinem’s collection Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, 2nd edition (1995). This volume also contains the essay “Erotica vs. Pornography,” which was integral to my formative thinking about porn.
2. Ordeal (1980) is the third in a series of publications listing Linda Lovelace as their author. Linda had previously published the (alleged) autobiographies Inside Linda Lovelace (1973) and The Intimate Diary of Linda Lovelace (1974). Compared to Ordeal and the subsequent Out Of Bondage (1986), these earlier texts are remarkably different in content and tone. Linda claimed Chuck Traynor was responsible for shaping the first two books, using her name and persona without her approval.
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