Corporeal Entrepreneurialism and Neoliberal Agency in the Sex Trade at the US-Mexican Border

Susanne Hofmann, “Corporeal Entrepreneurialism and Neoliberal Agency in the Sex Trade at the US-Mexican Border”. WSQ: Women’s Studies Quarterly 38: 3 & 4 (Fall/Winter 2010)

In this essay I will discuss corporeal entrepreneurialism in the context of commercial sex and neoliberal agency at the United States–Mexico border. I want to situate the sex trade in a larger neoliberal context of economic need, mobility, and commercialization. The essay addresses how bodily entrepreneurialism can function as a gateway to upward social mobility and how erotic capital can level existing social and economic inequalities and thus act as a catalyst to exit marginalized communities. I am drawing on Wacquant’s (1995) work on corporeal entrepreneurs and also on the notion of bodily capital that he has developed therein. Using bodily capital in the context of sex work, it makes sense to talk more specifically about erotic capital, which is the primary currency in the sex trade. Thus, I will integrate Isaiah Green’s (2008) definition of erotic capital and elaborate how women make use of their bodies to enhance their erotic capital and explain what their strategies and perceptions are. Inspired by Alexander Edmonds’ (2007) work on beauty and race in Brazil, I will elaborate how corporeal entrepreneurs strategically use their bodily and erotic capital to counteract their socioeconomic marginalization and challenge traditional hierarchies. As will become clear, corporeal entrepreneurialism ties together women’s agency, market demand, and monetary value, and, to succeed, this endeavor requires enormous levels of discipline, emotional resilience, management skills, stamina, and purposefulness.

Full text available here.

Body issues: The political economy of male sex work

Body issues: The political economy of male sex work. Nicola J Smith. Sexualities Vol 15, Issue 5-6, pp. 586 – 603. First published date: September-24-2012

The analysis of global sexual economies has emerged as an important part of a wider feminist project to re-imagine the boundaries of what constitutes the ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ of globalisation and capitalism. Emphasising the importance of such an agenda, the article argues that continued understandings of commercial sex as ‘women’s work’ place male and transgender bodies on the outside rather than the inside of the analysis of global sexual economies. Highlighting the need to address this gap in contemporary theorising and empirical analysis, the article then offers an illustration of research into male sex work through discussion of how male escorts in San Francisco negotiate the complex meanings and practices surrounding gender, sexuality and political economy.

Full text of author’s original manuscript available here.

Sex Workers and Human Rights: A Critical Analysis of Laws Regarding Sex Work

Rachel Marshall, Sex Workers and Human Rights: A Critical Analysis of Laws Regarding Sex Work, 23 Wm. & Mary J. Women & L. 47 (2016), http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/wmjowl/vol23/iss1/5

From:

2016 Special Issue: Combating Human Trafficking Through Law and Social Policy, William & Mary Journal of Women and the Law, Volume 23 (2016-2017), Issue 1 (2016)

 

Going to Work at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch. Potentials of Rhetorical and Ethnographic Methods for Cultural Studies

Dunn, Jennifer C. “Going to Work at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch Potentials of Rhetorical and Ethnographic Methods for Cultural Studies.” Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies 16, no. 6 (December 1, 2016): 525–35. doi:10.1177/1532708616655822.

Abstract

Most studies of media focus on production, representation, or audience. Using rhetorical analysis and ethnographic field methods, my article offers one way to study media production contexts, representations, and audience interactions in relation to one another. For this project, I conducted a narrative rhetorical analysis of the reality docu-series Cathouse that takes place in a legal brothel in Nevada, the Moonlite Bunny Ranch. In addition, I visited the brothel and used ethnographic field methods of participant observation and interviewing to investigate the lived experiences of the women working at the Ranch. My analysis revealed a web of intertextual discourses of prostitution that I could not have accessed had I not used these methods in conjunction with one another. By bringing perspectives from rhetorical inquiry, cultural and media studies, and ethnography into conversation with one another, I provide a framework for analyzing production, representation, and audience for the Cathouse series, while attending to both the content of the women’s stories and how these participants rhetorically constructed and performed their identities. Finally, my analysis offers insights into ethnographic and textual “crises of representation” in relation to the concept of “rhetorical authenticity” in media representations, the relationships between audience members, production, and representation in reality television, and material impacts for the women who work at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch that I could not have accessed without using these methods together.

Female Sex Tourism in Jamaica: An Assessment of Perceptions

Spencer, Andrew, and Dalea Bean. “Female Sex Tourism in Jamaica: An Assessment of Perceptions.” Journal of Destination Marketing & Management. Accessed November 6, 2016. doi:10.1016/j.jdmm.2016.10.002.

Abstract

Much has been said about tourist sexual behavior in the Global South. These studies range from those who view men’s and women’s sexual sojourn as distinctly different activities (sex versus romance tourism respectively) to those who consider sex and romance tourism as independent of sexed and gendered bodies. This work attempts to assess this critical aspect of tourism in Jamaica. Through data collection in two phases and using mixed methodology, the study seeks to assess the perception of local hotel workers and female tourists to the issue of sex and romance tourism. Findings indicate that while male and female hotel workers tend to view men as searching for sex and women for romance, female tourists are largely discrediting the perception that men and women seek distinctly different things while on vacation. The paper argues that there is therefore need to shift the paradigm of sex tourism research to include a wider range of perceptions. The implications for destination marketing are then discussed.

‘Protection against the Lust of Men’: Progressivism, Prostitution and Rape in the Dominican Republic under US Occupation, 1916–24

Wright, Micah. “‘Protection against the Lust of Men’: Progressivism, Prostitution and Rape in the Dominican Republic under US Occupation, 1916–24.” Gender & History 28, no. 3 (November 1, 2016): 623–40. doi:10.1111/1468-0424.12242.

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Abstract

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This article explains the disparity between the United States (US) military government’s efforts to defend and empower local women during the first occupation of the Dominican Republic (1916–24) and its reputation for tolerating sexual assault. It argues that US officials, inspired by a progressive ideology that linked the social, economic and political spheres, set out to reshape Dominican sexual and gender norms as a means to ensure political stability. Yet, these efforts fell victim to both Dominican and US Marines’ conceptions of gender and normative sexuality. Building upon a thriving body of scholarship that addresses the significance of US efforts to redefine Dominican gender norms, this article analyses the military government’s policies towards women and provost courts’ responses to sexual assault. It concludes that, combined with an aggressive anti-prostitution campaign, the military government’s reforms succeeded only in creating an atmosphere favourable to crimes against women. Moreover, rape and the way it was prosecuted revitalised the patriarchal norms that US officials had set out to transform, thus setting the stage for the regime of Rafael Leonidas Trujillo, whose thirty-year dictatorship depended on the conspicuous control of women. Thus, US policies and attitudes not only ensured the failure of progressive reform but also contributed to the ongoing subjugation of the very women the military government had pledged to empower.

Transitional Housing Facilities for Women Leaving the Sex Industry: Informed by Evidence or Ideology?

Dewey, Susan, Jennifer Hankel, and Kyria Brown. “Transitional Housing Facilities for Women Leaving the Sex Industry: Informed by Evidence or Ideology?” Sexuality & Culture, August 12, 2016, 1–22. doi:10.1007/s12119-016-9379-5.

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Abstract

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This article juxtaposes the results of descriptive and inferential statistical analysis, derived from 125 client case files at a Denver transitional housing facility for women leaving the sex industry, with the results of a content analysis that examined how all 34 similar U.S. facilities represent themselves, their clients, and their services on their websites. Content analysis results ascertained four primary findings with respect to transitional housing facilities for women leaving the sex industry, including their conflation of sex trading with sex trafficking, dominance by Christian faith-based organizations, race-neutral approach, and depiction of their clients as uneducated and socially isolated. Yet our statistical analysis revealed that significant differences exist between women’s sex industry experiences in ways that are strongly determined by ethno-racial identity, age, marital status, and exposure to abuse throughout the life course. Juxtaposing the results of these analyses highlights some rather glaring disconnects between the ways that facility websites depict their clients and the meaningful differences between women seeking services at the Denver transitional housing facility. These findings raise significant concerns regarding approaches that ignore ethno-racial differences, collapse the sex industry’s complexity, make assumptions about the women’s educational or other needs, and neglect the importance of women’s community and relational ties. Taken together, these troubling realities suggest a need for evidenced-based, rather than ideology-based, alternatives for women who wish to leave the sex industry.