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Sexualities, Vol. 5, No. 1, 49-66 (2002)
DOI: 10.1177/1363460702005001003

Naked Power: The Practice of Stripping as a Confidence Game

Lisa Pasko

University of Hawaii at Manoa pasko{at}hawaii.edu

The stripper-customer interaction is a complicated manipulation of emotional labour and symbolic communication. Using a series of carefully constructed interactions resembling a confidence game, strippers create and maintain control over their customers. This article uses findings from a participant-observation study performed in Hawaii and explores the motivation, social roles, and consequences involved in the striptease act. In an attempt to acquire a monetary reward, strippers: (1) forge feelings of intimacy and emotional connectedness; and/or (2) fulfill customer fantasies by assuming the sex- object role. This article concludes: (1) strippers have power in their individual interactions with customers; (2) this power does not translate into gender relations in mainstream society; and (3) the emotionally and sexually manipulative act of stripping has outcomes of psychological and social estrangement, stigmatization and potential victimization for the dancers.

Key Words: confidence game • gender • sex work • sexuality • symbolic interaction


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