LOS ANGELES—Sociologist Chauntelle Anne Tibbals, Ph.D., best known to the adult industry as "Dr. Chauntelle," is pleased to announce publication of her newest research "When Law Moves Quicker Than Culture: Key Jurisprudential Regulations Shaping the US Adult Content Production Industry."
The article, which appears in The Scholar: St Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice (2013, 15:2), uses historical sociology to explore the research question: Why, in spite of its legal and protected status, is adult content and adult content production still a stigmatizing and polarizing dimension of US culture?
"This is something that's always confounded me," Tibbals stated. "Adult content production is legal in the US and we hear endless rhetoric about the adult industry mainstreaming, but we as a culture still seem to struggle with porn."
The Scholar: St Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice is dedicated to fighting for the rights of the legally disadvantaged and unrepresented by exposing injustice and educating the legal community. Learn more about The Scholar here.
Starting in the 1970s and including examples occurring as recently as 2012, Tibbals considers key jurisprudential proceedings, technological developments, and intersections between porn and wider society. Each dimension points to legal findings out-pacing socio-cultural evolutions.
"I was excited to bring law, history and sociology together in this work... and I was especially excited to demonstrate the ways in which these developments impact the real world today," Tibbals explained. "I just hope it does some good!"
Certainly, among the sections well worth reading are Tibbals' analysis of the adult careers of both Traci Lords/Nora Kuzma, for whom Tibbals presents evidence that law enforcement authorities were aware of Lords' underage status for almost her entire time acting in adult, and Linda Lovelace/Linda Boreman, of whom she notes that despite all of the news stories and punditry surrounding her career in and after porn, there exists no evidence that anyone in the adult industry itself abused her or forced her to do anything; that was all (allegedly) done by her husband at the time, Chuck Traynor.
Also of interest is Tibbals' analysis of the Meese Commission, and how many Hollywood celebrities such as Colleen Dewhurst (speaking for the entire Actor's Equity Association), feminist author Betty Friedan and author Kurt Vonnegut came to the defense of the adult industry's (and Hollywood's) free speech rights after the report was published.
Finally, Tibbals details two of the major obscenity cases of the past decade: Seymour Butts'/Adam Glasser's bust in Los Angeles for having released Tampa Tushy Fest, which contained fisting, and the Extreme Associates case which took nearly a decade to resolve and in the end was not an "obscenity win" for the Department of Justice.
Dr. Tibbals is a sociologist specializing in gender, sexualities, work and organizations, and media and popular culture. Her research has been published in numerous scholarly journals including Sexualities, Gender Work & Organization, and Stanford Law and Policy Review. She has been quoted and cited by numerous cultural and news media outlets and currently holds a Visiting Scholar position at the University of Southern California (USC).
To learn more about Tibbals' work and for a copy of "When Law Moves Quicker Than Culture," email her here or click here, and visit her on Twitter.
