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Exotic Dancing and the Negotiation of Identity

The Multiple Uses of Body Technologies

University of Central Florida

This study investigates the multiple uses of body technologies by female exotic dancers and the relationship to dancers’negotiations of identity. Using ethnographic methods, primarily in-depth interviews, this article probes the ways that dancers alter their bodies to earn money while also attempting to re-create different meanings through their bodies. In fact, the women use body technologies for multiple purposes but make choices about their bodies in a context that rewards them for only sexualized one-dimensional meanings. Body technologies both hinder and help the attempts these women make to manage subsequent identity complications and are engaged on different levels. This article highlights the ways that body technologies reflect the dancers’ struggles concerning body and identity.

Key Words: exotic dancing • body technology • identity • body • gender

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