Cultural History

This movie isn’t always as appreciated as it ought to be. People too often hear the name “Billy Wilder” and expect a ‘screwball comedy’ but completely miss the deeper, darker tones… Kiss Me, Stupid is one of those films. 

People may chuckle & hoot at the idea of Dean playing “Dino,” a caricature of the drinking, skirt-chasing Dean Martin persona, and the comedy of errors involving mistaken identities, but what they fail to see is black comedy teeth that takes a bite out of the music industry, marriage, and even sex...

During World War I, 18,000 American military personnel were incapacitated by sexually transmitted diseases each day. By the height of World War II, the rate had been reduced to about 600 a day.

In January, National Trafficking Awareness Month prompted me to hunt for one of the many books in my sex work history collection which would illustrate that it's the same old story ~ and worse, the...

Erotic Heritage Museum is closing: [A]pparently due to an unpaid rent dispute with landlord, Déjà Vu strip-club magnate Harry Mohoney who donated the land for museum use back in 2008. Speaking to the Las Vegas Weekly, Mohoney assured visitors that the museum would not be closing its doors for good, saying of his now-former tenants, “They have been asked to vacate the property so that the Erotic Heritage Museum can be given a fresh new look at erotic history and art.”

Museum operations manager Jerry Zientara, however, see things a bit differently, claiming the museum’s collection is under the stewardship of the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, the nonprofit organization that opened and has been operating the museum since its inception. “We don’t know when we’ll be loading things out,” he told Las Vegas Weekly earlier this month, “but we do expect to be doing that.” And, true to his word, a call for volunteers to help with removal of exhibits and cleaning of the space came

The Devadasi, a centuries-old caste of sacred temple priestesses, struggles to have it's own renaissance. One woman leads the way...

The origins of the practice are often disputed, but historians agree that in India by the 10th century this caste of sacred temple servants enjoyed great wealth & property as signs of respect & clout.

Considered married to the Hindu deities, the Devadasi were talented dancers, singers & even viewed as political advisors. At the core of Devadasi faith is the belief all men are incarnations of the male deities & so in addition to performing sacred temple ceremonies, Devadasis offered sexual services. In the act of making love, a man & a Devadasi enact the sacred marriage of god & goddess which therefore allows them to become divine themselves.

St. Louis is replete with history when it comes to its queer community. In the months prior to the June 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City’s Greenwich Village—widely hailed as one of the catalysts for the modern LGBT rights movement—the seeds were already being sewn for The Gateway City’s first LGBT rights organization, The Mandrake Society.