Gender and Sexuality in the Field: A Female Ethnographer's Experience Researching Drug Use in Dance Clubs

Abstract

This article provides an account of a female ethnographer's experience accessing participants and observing drug-using behaviors in highly sexualized dance clubs. Specifically, it describes how the researcher as a gendered and sexualized self can compromise safety and inhibit access while also serving as an advantage to establishing rapport. The author describes how various methods were employed to appear as part of the cultural scene and access participants, while avoiding, and responding to, unwanted sexual advances. To address such challenges, the author provides both practical and procedural suggestions for researchers and research institutions.

RÉSUMÉ

Cet article raconte l’histoire d’une ethnographe à la recherche de participants pour observer leur comportement de consommation de drogue dans des lieux chargés de tensions sexuelles fortes comme les boîtes de nuit. Elle décrit, en particulier, comment un chercheur lui-même sexué peut trouver des compromis en terme de sécurité et d’interdiction tout en utilisant ses caractéristiques propres à son avantage pour établir son rapport. L’auteur décrit les différentes méthodes utilisées pour s’intégrer à cette communauté tout en ignorant ou en acceptant des avances sexuelles non sollicitées. Pour prendre en compte ces problématiques, l’auteur propose, pour les chercheurs et les instituts de recherche, une méthodologie à la fois pratique et théorique.

RESUMEN

Este artículo da un relato de una etnógrafa y su experiencia observando el comportamiento relacionado al uso de drogas y obteniendo informacion de los participantes en un club erotico. Específicamente, describe cómo la investigadora, como un ser, puede ceder la seguridad e inhibir el acceso a participantes mientras también ententando establezer relaciónes. La autora describe varios métodos que fueron empleados para parecer como parte de la escena cultural del club y accesar participantes, mientras evitando y respondiendo a los avances sexuales no deseados. Para dirigir tales desafíos, la autora da sugerencias prácticas para instituciones de investigadores e investigación.

Keywords :

• ethnography
• qualitative research
• participant-observations
• fieldwork
• field relations
• gaining access
• researcher safety
• gender
• heterosexual
• sexualized
• dance club culture
• club drugs
• drug use
• impression management

THE AUTHORS

Dina Perrone, Ph.D., is an assistant professor at Bridgewater State College. She received her M.A. and Ph.D. in criminal justice from the School of Criminal Justice at Rutgers University-Newark. There she achieved a University Grant for her dissertation project on New York City club kids in which she uncovers the complex culture, patterns, settings, rituals, and harms associated with drug use. Dina was awarded a National Institute of Drug Abuse Behavioral Sciences Training Pre-Doctoral Fellowship at the National Development Research Institute, Inc. While she has written various articles within the criminal justice field—topics including the privatization of prisons and self-control theory—her primary areas of research interest include drug use, drug policy, and deviance. Her interests lie in dissecting the drug user stereotype through understanding patterns of use, drug experiences, and mitigating factors of harm.

Notes

1 These clubbers borrow this name from the clubbers of the early 1990s in New York City, who were associated with club owner Peter Gatien, club kid Michael Alig, and the club Limelight (see Owen, 2003).

2 Because most research of club drug users has focused on rave or dance club populations, it may have missed other populations of drug users (i.e., street users) (cf., Novoa, Ompad, Wu, Vlahov, Galea, 2005). Recent studies have shown that club drug use is increasingly prevalent among other populations (e.g., Krebs and Steffey, 2005; Lankenau and Clatts, 2005; Maxwell and Spence, 2005; Novoa et al., 2005).