The Closing of Atlantis

Abstract

SUMMARY This article examines the author's experience of cultural bias as a spectator at a now-defunct, predominately white, working class American burlesque house called Club Atlantis in Baltimore, Maryland. The club was well known in the mid-Atlantic region for its all-nude male dancers. According to the author, Club Atlantis was less known for its sometimes subtle and sometimes overt unwelcome treatment of black American or dark-skinned patrons and its unwritten policy of banning black American or dark-skinned would-be strippers. Based on personal observations and informal interviews conducted between 2002 and 2004, and written in a manner common to the author's disciplines of creative nonfiction and the performing arts, the article argues for increased examination of erotic performance as a form of sex work. The article also argues for further study of the racial politics of commercial sex.