Abstract

In this essay I will explore through the lenses of theory and experimental narrative the work of women who dance in the sex industry.  One of the predominant theoretical questions that quietly weaves through this paper is “What is the relationship between the actual physical body and the analysis?”  By making available my own bodily experience of stripping and my own bodily experience of analysis (yes, it does feel like something,) I try to weave a web of relevance between body and theory.  My body and my theory, the fungible, flexible site of body, the mutable, mercurial site of theory.  I have no access to a language that does not juxtapose the words body and mind, even in the molding of this sentenceI have grammatically reified such a duality. My hope is to create a locale and a language where bodymind is beyond the strictures currently in place.  But I will try and maintain a relationship to the agency of these theories compelling me to question the very modes by which I theorize, to explore the discursive nature of evidence, and to continually question my scholarly approach.  I try to do what I theorize about; I try to live the theory.

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