Workshops
You can also download a PDF of my 2011 workshops (with photos and a full bio), or my one-pager and hi-res photos as part of my press kit page.
Current workshop offerings include:
Fucking with Gender (2 hours)
Presented at Duke University (NJ), Brown University (RI), Northwestern University (Chicago), Smith College (Northampton, MA), Swarthmore University (Philadelphia), and more. Ideal for a classroom.
Developed explicitly for students of gender studies, sexuality studies, and queer studies, this interactive, signature workshop with Sinclair Sexsmith explores gender expression, identities, labels, transcending the mutually exclusive binaries, queer culture, and hot sweaty sex. We’ll explore how our culture values sex, how to get what we want out of relationships, how to turn up the heat on our own sex drive, and how to communicate better with our lovers. We’ll play with concepts of how gender identity and sexual identity intersect, butch/femme roles as a language of desire, how labels can be restrictive or liberating, whether gender is a fetish or a kink, and how to have more dirty queer sex.
Radical & Responsible Gender: Feminism, Masculinity, Misogyny, & Femininity (1.5-2 hours)
Presented at Smith College, NYU in 2010
Academics breaks down and deconstructs gender. How do we build it back up radically andresponsibly? How does one adapt masculinity or femininity “positively”? How do we become responsible about gender? How do we continue to break down the gender role restrictions that are hurtful and traumatizing? In this interactive, engaging workshop, we will cover some basics about what gender is, what gender roles and stereotypes are, and how they work, then cover basic gender theory, breaking things down into small parts, in order to build them back up again “responsibly,” by which I mean thoughtfully and intentionally, with feminist principles and anti-sexist perspectives strongly in place. Participants will go away from the workshop with a better sense of how to use labels as liberation instead of limiting, as celebrations rather than restrictions, and be able to more fully embody whichever gender roles they choose.
Cock Confidence: Strap-On 101 (1-1.5 hours)
Presented at KinkForAll New York City, Fascinations (Portland, OR), Butch Voices NYC, and others.
Many of us have experience with strapping on, packing, and playing, but there are lots of new products out there on the market that might be exciting and that you haven’t encountered yet. Writer and sex educator Sinclair Sexsmith talk about what cocks are good for packing, what options are out there for pack-and-play, which harnesses are the most loved, and which to avoid. Plus, she’ll delve into some cock confidence, getting into the psychology of penetration, and discussing what it’s like to shoot from the hip. Come get the nuts and bolts of strapping it on and fucking. You’ll learn about positions and lube, how different products work, what “cock confidence” means, and the psychology behind strapping on and playing with a cock with a partner, or with oneself.
Advanced Cock Confidence
So you know how to strap on—Great! Are you looking to increase sensation for yourself and your partner? How can you enhance your cock mindfulness? Are there contradictions to receiving penetration as a guy, a butch, or a stud? How does strap on play change as our bodies get older? What size is your cock, and what size should it be? Come learn more about constructing an advanced cock-centric sexuality, and preview some of the more unusual cocks on the market made for packing, pissing, and shooting.
Queering Power Dynamics: D/s, Age Play, and Beyond (1-1.5 hours)
Intermediate to advanced; ideal for 20-30 people.
Top, bottom, switch, and everything in between: many of us like to explore what it’s like to give up or take power in our sex play. Some of us even like to play with psychological domination and submission. Let’s explore 24/7 role play or domination and submission. What happens when we incorporate identities like “Daddy” from the leather community? What could other age play roles of bigs and littles, Daddies and Mommies, boys and bois and girls and grrrls, have to offer us as we seek deeper and more fulfilling sex explorations? We’ll discuss bringing a power exchange relationship of any sort from the bedroom into a 24/7 lifestyle, what the benefits are for both, and how to go about navigating long term fulfillment for all parties within the relationship.
Steamy: How To Write About Sex
To write about sex well you need the boldness to command and describe the dirty and oh so delicious acts we humans explore, and the basic writing skills of plot, setting, and character. In this pen-to-paper writing workshop we’ll look at some examples of extremely successful and unsuccessful erotica, steamy love letters for your sweetheart, how to step up your blog to the next level, where to submit your work for publication in the erotica world, and some quick basics for editing your work. Bring a paper and writing utensil, we will be doing writing exercises.
Gendering Power: How to Spice Up Your Role Play (2 hours)
Presented at the Lesbian Sex Mafia (New York City), Conversio Virium (New York City), and others. Ideal for a classroom.
Perhaps gender roles are just a construct. But that doesn’t mean they’re not hot! Lots of queers come to our own unique expressions of gender, and it can be a powerful way to explore many sides of ourselves with each other. Adding gender dynamics to sex play can encourage self-discovery, to solidify or express identities which are budding, or to further express identities already in progress. In this interactive workshop we will explore the addition and power of gender roles in sexual role play scenarios to increase desire, vulnerability, self-knowledge, and intimacy. Bring a pen and your notebook, we’ll do some writing exercises to get us thinking.
Talk Dirtier: How to Let Your Tongue Go (1-1.5 hours)
Beginner to intermediate; ideal for 20-30 people.
Talking dirty in the bedroom can be terrifying at first, but once you unlock your tongue, you’ll find yourself saying all sorts of delicious things! Come to this workshop and we’ll figure out what’s tying our tongues in the first place, what’s holding us back from being more free with our language in the bedroom, and what the heck we should say to enhance our sex and intensity our sensation. The brain is the biggest sex organ, after all, and the more we can turn on our minds, the better our experiences will be.
Making Queer & Kinky Relationships Work: Things They Should Have Taught Us
We’ve all heard that “relationships take work,” but what kind of work exactly do they take? How do we know if we’re in a good one? And how can we make a good one last? This workshop will explore all sorts of skills that we should have been learning all along, but that are significantly lacking in this culture. We’ll do exercises on identifying cultural norms & personal values, accountability, naming & setting boundaries, strengthening support networks, and more. Bring a paper and writing utensil, we will be doing writing exercises.
Writing Ourselves into Existence: Queer Stories (1.5 hours)
Traditional publishing through books, magazines, and literary journals have typically excluded gay stories, characters, revelations, and identity development. Navigating the world of literature can be extremely othering as a queer person attempting to write about queer lives, constantly being questioned for our cultural representations in writing. But Judy Shepard continues to say that coming out is the most important thing we can do, that indeed it is a political act, which encourages and advocates for visibility. Telling our stories is one way to make ourselves visible. Come to this interactive writing workshop and learn about the history of queer stories, what the queer story looks like, alternate forms of publishing such as chapbooks and blogs, and begin to form your own queer story. Bring paper and a writing utensil, please!
Social Change Through Writing – Online and Offline (1.5 hours)
Can writing encourage individual, personal growth? Absolutely. Following one’s emotional landscape in words (or other art forms) can lead us to new and profound revelations about how we work. But can writing encourage social change? I believe it can. With a deep belief that the personal is political, writing about our own lives, worlds, feelings, emotional landscapes, and cultural contexts can encourage personal, social, and political empowerment in our subcultures and in our lives. Come to this interactive writing workshop and we will discuss what social change is, how it has been achieved in the past, the history upon which the current social change movements are built, and the media that is revolutionizing social change activism: The Internet. Bring paper and a writing utensil, please!