Press
“How Catlyn delivers this book is brilliant. Her voice is distinctive and makes this book, even in uncomfortable situations, such an easy and incredible read from the start.. How she talks about the people she works with and meets, challenges what you anticipate might be the situation and challenges the stereotypes that are perpetuated by media on who these women are and the men who visit them. The frankness of the writing and the delivery of this book is incredible and it makes me want to read so much more of her work, Ladd’s way with words shines in this short but honest book.”
- Victoria Casswell, Books, Lots Of Books, Plenty Of Books, Books Everywhere!
“Strip: The Making of a Feminist provides a detailed account of Catlyn Ladd’s experience stripping over the course of five years. While like other autoethnographic accounts of the strip club industry, Ladd’s contribution to the genre involves her incorporation of feminist critique within a sex positive framework. Ladd skillfully explores the nuances of female sexual empowerment while evaluating her own experience as “empowered” within a racist, capitalist, hetero-patriarchal work environment and culture. She reveals that although stripping can empower some women, this empowerment exists within the context of broader social systems that grant certain women the privilege of empowerment. In other words, some women choose to strip out of desire, while others choose to strip out of need, or perhaps do not have a choice. These realizations help Ladd synthesize her experience into a tale of growth, whereby the reader begins with a basic introduction to the industry in Section I and is lead through Ladd’s growing feminist consciousness in the following sections. It is within these sections we see Ladd explore the contradictions of female sexual empowerment, but it is this exploration that reminds the reader of sex positivity’s significance for women in the United States.”
- Katherine Martinez, Ph.D., Author of Somebody's Fetish: Self-objectification and body satisfaction among consensual sadomasochists, Journal of Sex Res
Read more at Changemakers Books
“Strip” reveals Colorado professor Catlyn Ladd’s path from dancer to Ph.D.
PUBLISHED: October 7, 2018
The Denver Post
At age 19, Catlyn Ladd had just returned to the United States after studying at the University of Oxford. She wasn’t interested in living in a dorm on a college campus, but couldn’t afford her own place on the bare-bones salary of her work-study gig.
“I also did not have time for a regular job, and minimum wage was not much better than the work-study money,” she writes in “Strip: The Making of a Feminist,” which was published June 29 by Changemakers Books. “I needed a job that paid a lot and had flexible hours.”
That job was stripping.
From Exotic Dancer to College Professor, Catlyn Ladd Wrote the Book
PATRICIA CALHOUN | JUNE 28, 2018 | 7:39AM
The Denver Westword
Can stripping be a feminist act? Or is stripping inherently degrading sex work that objectifies the women who choose it as a profession? Catlyn Ladd worked as an exotic dancer for five years, using the money she made to earn a doctorate in religious studies at the University of Denver/Iliff School of Theology. She now teaches women’s studies and religious studies at [a two year college in Colorado], where she's been a full-time faculty member since 2006. In her first book, Strip: The Making of a Feminist, Ladd brings her academic eye to bear on a controversial topic that is often overlooked and ignored.
Strip: The Making of a Feminist was just published this week by Changemakers Books; in advance of its release, we spoke with Ladd about her book, her career path, and what she learned about life from stripping...