Tearoom Trade (original) (raw)
Tearoom Trade: Impersonal Sex in Public Places is a 1970 non-fiction book by American sociologist Laud Humphreys, based on his 1968 Ph.D. dissertation "Tearoom Trade: A Study of Homosexual Encounters in Public Places." The study is an analysis of men who participate in anonymous sex with other men in public lavatories, a practice known as "tea-rooming" or "cottaging". Humphreys asserted that the men participating in such activity came from diverse social backgrounds, had differing personal motives for seeking sex in such venues, and variously self-perceived as "straight," "bisexual," or "gay."