Loraine Hutchins, Ph.D., is a founder and leader of the U.S. bisexual rights
and liberation movement who has increasingly integrated issues of spirituality
into her sexuality education work. She co-edited Bi Any Other Name: Bisexual
People Speak Out, the anthology that catalyzed the bi movement and is still
in print and well-beloved in college courses thirteen years later. A native
Washingtonian, Hutchins has always emphasized the inter-connecting issues of
race, gender and class in her work and sexual liberation's connection to overall
issues of social justice and human rights.
Her 2001 doctoral dissertation, "Erotic Rites: A Cultural Analysis of
Contemporary U.S. Sacred Sexuality Traditions and Trends," offers a queer
feminist approach to the variety of sex-positive spiritualities being explored
and practiced in the U.S. today. Hutchins is a teacher of sacred sex and works
as a sex coach with particular outreach to LGBT, aging, women, and disability
populations.
Hutchins was raised a progressive Methodist in the crucible of the
civil rights movement and often speaks about how her family's fight for an
integrated neighborhood church shaped her early identity. As an adult she became Wiccan
and is a solitaire practitioner who names Buddhism, Tantra, Taoism, and all of
the world's mystical traditions as part of her roots. During graduate school
she co-led a sacred sex group as part of her internship. An account of this
group, Sacred Flame, is published in the anthology, Blessed Bi Spirit,
edited by Deb Kolodny. Her internship also involved launching and directing the
highly popular 1998 Washington, D.C., EroSpirit Sacred Sexuality Seminar Series,
which was free and open to the public and which she and other presenters are
planning to revive in 2004.
She is writing a new book, Harlots & Healers, based on research
arising out of her dissertation, that particularly looks at the intersection of
roles between sex workers and helping professions. Her dissertation and excerpts
from it are available on her website.
(This biographical statement provided by Loraine
Hutchins.)