Born Unto Brothels – Toward a Legal Ethnography of Sex Work in an Indian Red-Light Area

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prabha Kotiswaran
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Light Area

Born unto Brothels—Toward a Legal Ethnography of Sex Work in an Indian Red-Light Area

2008 ◽  
Vol 33 (03) ◽  
pp. 579-629 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prabha Kotiswaran
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Sex Industry ◽  
Legal Rules ◽  
Market Structures ◽  
Light Area

The global sex panic around sex work and trafficking has fostered prostitution law reform worldwide. While the normative status of sex work remains deeply contested, abolitionists and sex work advocates alike display an unwavering faith in the power of criminal law; for abolitionists, strictly enforced criminal laws can eliminate sex markets, whereas for sex work advocates, decriminalization can empower sex workers. I problematize both narratives by delineating the political economy and legal ethnography of Sonagachi, one of India's largest red-light areas. I show how within Sonagachi there exist highly internally differentiated groups of stakeholders, including sex workers, who, variously endowed by a plural rule network—consisting of formal legal rules, informal social norms, and market structures—routinely enter into bargains in the shadow of the criminal law whose outcomes cannot be determined a priori. I highlight the complex relationship between criminal law and sex markets by analyzing the distributional effects of criminalizing customers on Sonagachi's sex industry.

scholarly journals Prevalence of soft-tissue lesions among women in sex work in the red light area of Pune, India: A cross-sectional survey

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 218
Author(s):  
Shrikanth Muralidharan ◽  
Arunkumar Acharya ◽  
Tejaswi Sevekari ◽  
Sanaa Wadwan ◽  
NoopurRajiv Joglekar ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Soft Tissue ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Cross Sectional Survey ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Soft Tissue Lesions ◽  
Light Area

scholarly journals “I Am Almost a Breadwinner for My Family”: Exploring the Manifestation of Agency in Sex Workers’ Personal and Professional Contexts

Affilia ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 088610992110227
Author(s):  
Sharvari Karandikar ◽  
Kaitlin Casassa ◽  
Logan Knight ◽  
Megan España ◽  
Njeri Kagotho
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Female Sex Workers ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Structural Factors ◽  
Female Sex ◽  
Light Area ◽  
Professional Contexts ◽  
Depth Interviews

While societal and structural factors often constrain women’s agency in patriarchal settings, women nevertheless find creative ways to manifest and develop agency. Female sex workers (FSWs), in particular, are regularly assumed to have little or no agency, but an important body of literature suggests otherwise. To add to this knowledge, this study sought to answer the question: How do FSWs in Mumbai, India, exert agency in personal and professional contexts? In-depth interviews were conducted with 12 FSWs in the Kamathipura red-light area. Four themes emerged: (a) sex work as a rational and empowering choice, (b) resources and assets, (c) sex work as a means of achievement, and (d) managing violence, retribution, and fear. These themes reveal expressions of agency that illustrate how sex workers are intentional, rational, goal-oriented, and resilient. The findings of this study can contribute to the removal of stigma surrounding sex work and inform service providers working with this population in their efforts to treat sex workers with dignity and respect. Further research is needed in this area, especially which centers on the voices of the agentic sex workers themselves.

Beyond the Brothels: A Qualitative Study of the Destitute Female Sex Workers of Central Delhi Red Light Area

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-36
Author(s):  
Anushree Nagpal ◽  
Atiqua Tajdar ◽  
Masood Ahsan Siddiqui ◽  
Mohammad Hassan ◽  
Suman Gaur ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sex Workers ◽  
Female Sex Workers ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Economic Status ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Voluntary Organizations ◽  
Female Sex ◽  
Familial Support ◽  
Medical Facilities ◽  
Light Area

The term ‘sex workers’ refers to those involved in prostitution. This particular term is preferred as it does not have the derogatory, sexist connotation that the term ‘prostitute’ has. Belonging to a highly stigmatized profession with no financial and familial support forthcoming, the latter years of the lives of destitute female sex workers are spent in abject misery and poverty. Effort has been made to study the socio economic status and the ways adopted by these women, post active prostitution period, to support themselves and their families. This paper is based on the field study conducted in central Delhi red light area during August-September, 2016. Direct interviews with the respondents using questionnaires as well as participant observation techniques were used to collect the data. The study indicate that destitute female sex workers, once out of active prostitution, start working as domestic helpers, work with local voluntary organizations, or as helpers in brothels. The income earned is very meager with hardly any amount left to be saved. Most of the women live in one room rented accommodations. Their access to medical facilities was found to be extremely restricted.

scholarly journals Of Raids and Returns: Sex work movement, police oppression, and the politics of the ordinary in Sonagachi, India

2019 ◽  
pp. 127-139
Author(s):  
Simanti Dasgupta
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Current Literature ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Red Light ◽  
State Violence ◽  
Labour Movement ◽  
Sex Worker ◽  
Labour Rights ◽  
Red Light District

Drawing on ethnographic work with Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC), a grassroots sex worker organisation in Sonagachi, the iconic red-light district in Kolkata, India, this paper explores the politics of the detritus generated by raids as a form of state violence. While the current literature mainly focuses on its institutional ramifications, this article explores the significance of the raid in its immediate relation to the brothel as a home and a space to collectivise for labour rights. Drawing on atyachar (oppression), the Bengali word sex workers use to depict the violence of raids, I argue that they experience the raid not as a spectacle, but as an ordinary form of violence in contrast to their extraordinary experience of return to rebuild their lives. Return signals both a reclamation of the detritus as well as subversion of the state’s attempt to undermine DMSC’s labour movement.

The Insider Voice about Prostitution

2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 81-90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arti Sahu ◽  
Reshma Mondol ◽  
Fatima Khatoon ◽  
Neelam Chettry ◽  
Nageena Khatoon
Keyword(s):  
Violence Against Women ◽  
Sex Trafficking ◽  
West Bengal ◽  
Structural Violence ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Light Area ◽  
Trafficking Organization ◽  
Share Information

This piece* has been put together by drawing from Red Light Despatch (RLD), a monthly newsletter brought out by Indian anti-sex trafficking organization Apne Aap Women Worldwide. RLD is for the women of the red-light area by the women of the red-light area. Women, girls and men trapped in prostitution from the red-light areas of Bihar, Delhi, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, and West Bengal write the Despatch. They write for each other and share information, dreams, struggles and hopes in solidarity from different corners of India. They try to address the gaps in mainstream media that often do not cover information that is relevant to the poor and the marginalized. RLD also serves as a mouthpiece for prostituted women and survivors to end sex trafficking. The narratives in RLD reveal that prostitution is a form of violence against women and the only way to end it is by internalizing the Gandhian principles of ahimsa (non-violence) and antyodaya (uplift of the last). The narratives speak of how the prostituted child and woman is always originally trafficked and that she is the victim of structural violence as a female, as a person from the countryside, as a person from a scheduled caste/scheduled tribe or other backward classes and of unequal and lopsided development; and how difficult it is to exit prostitution.

Exploring Needs of Sex Workers From the Kamathipura Red-Light Area of Mumbai, India

2013 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 552-561 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lindsay Gezinski ◽  
Sharvari Karandikar
Keyword(s):  
Sex Workers ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Light Area

‘Voiceless Victims’: Children Living in the Red-Light Areas of Ibadan, Nigeria

2020 ◽  
pp. 251660692095056
Author(s):  
Richard A. Aborisade ◽  
Temitope A. Oshileye
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Child Protection ◽  
Illicit Drugs ◽  
Red Light ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Learning Theories ◽  
Commercial Sex ◽  
Cross Sectional Survey ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Commercial Sex Work

Much research work on victims of sex work, including studies employing feminist perspectives, focuses on sex work as either being a ‘victimless crime’, or women as victims, leaving the victimization of children as direct and proximate victims relatively unexplored. The practice of commercial sex work in Nigeria is illegal; however, sex business thrives in most urban centres with considerable prevalence of red-light districts. Brothels, strip clubs and other sex-oriented businesses that constitute red-light districts are usually located in neighbourhoods where people that have no business with sex work live with their families. This present study, therefore, moves to expose the risks and vulnerabilities of children living in red-light areas. Drawing on social disorganization and learning theories, an analytical cross-sectional survey of residents of neighbourhoods where commercial sex work thrives within the city of Ibadan was conducted. Fifty-seven family men and women living in red-light areas with their children were purposively selected to provide data for the qualitative study. The rate of children’s engagement in premarital sex, consumption of illicit drugs, alcoholic intake, stealing, street fighting, and school dropout was found to be a factor of their intimacy with sex work and workers in red-light areas. The study concludes that children who grow up in red-light areas are more vulnerable to being physically, emotionally, sexually abused and exploited than children who do not live in such areas. Regulation of sex work activities and prioritizing of child protection issues were suggested.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document