Esther Newton's PhD dissertation examined the experiences, social interactions, and culture of drag queens, or (mostly gay-identified) men who dressed and performed as women in various kinds of theatrical settings or as an expression/performance of their sexual identity.

Later published in several articles and in 1972 as Mother Camp: Female Impersonators in America, Newton's work represented the first major anthropological study of a homosexual community in the United States, and laid some of the groundwork for theorists such as Judith Butler, who would later explore the performative dimensions of sex and gender roles.