Feeling gender speak: intersubjectivity and fieldwork practice with women who prostitute in Lima, Peru

This article discusses a dimension of fieldwork methodology often overlooked. It concerns the act of feeling (inferences) and how this subjective ability contributes to understanding cultural meanings, which are unspoken or encoded in dialogue, but remain unarticulated. The discovery of this dimension in fieldwork eventually brought several epistemological principles into question pertaining to power and intersubjectivity subscribed to in a feminist or critical anthropology. Simultaneously, the use of this dimension in fieldwork gave insight into the relational construction of gender identity - the author’s own, that of the women and a male assistant. The article illustrates this by reconstructing different ethnographic moments during fieldwork practice. Moreover, it aims to put these theoretical assertions into practice by presenting an ethnographic narrative intended to evoke meanings that contribute to feeling the construction of identity through interaction in fieldwork practice

Border skirmishes and the question of belonging: An authoethnographic account of everyday exclusion in multicultural society

Transnational migration has transformed most European countries, making the problem of how to 'integrate' an increasingly popular topic in public debates and social policy. It is assumed that as long as the newcomer learns the language, adapts to the local customs and finds work, s/he will be integrated and welcomed with open arms as a full-fledged member of society. Based on an autoethnography of our experiences as US-born, long-term and fully 'integrated' residents of the Netherlands, one of Europe's most multicultural societies, we have explored some of the subtle, well-intentioned practices of distancing and exclusion that are part of the fabric of everyday life. We will show how, contrary to the official discourse of integration, 'Dutch-ness' as a white/ethnic national identity is continuously constructed as a 'we', which excludes all 'others'. And, indeed, we have discovered that, paradoxically, the closer the 'other' comes to being completely assimilated into Dutch society, the more the symbolic borders of national belonging may need to be policed and tightened. © The Author(s) 2011

Introduction

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/67161/2/10.1177_0308275X9301300401.pd

Problematizing the 'prostitution problem' in Ethiopia: The stigmatization of sex workers through moral discourses and their representations

This chapter explores the multi-layer discourses about female sex work/sex workers in Ethiopia and how these contribute to sex workers’ exclusion and stigmatization in society. Findings suggest that stigma limits sex workers to be/come ‘empowered’, or to gain a say over their life’s choices. We specifically ask: how are sex workers represented in legislation, policies, national directives, public discourses and practices, and how do such representations (re)stigmatize them, as well as entail solutions for we have termed a situation of existential stalemate for sex workers? We discuss various representations of sex work and sex workers as these tend to evoke moral panic, which in turn leads to government and non-government actors creating no-way-out solutions for resolving the ‘problem’ of sex work. The focus on stigma to sex work emerged during a participatory research project, in which various actors in one way or another deal with stories about, and representations of sex work and/or sex workers in Ethiopia. Unanimously, and pervasively, these actors framed sex work as highly problematic, or as a vice that needs to be abolished. We therefore argue that alternative discourses, policies and programs underpinned in the public health, human and civil rights of sex workers need to be advanced in order to gradually diminish the inherent (re)criminalization and one-sided targeting of sex workers as a source of evil. Key words: sex workers, discourse, stigma, Ethiopia, existential stalemat

Reconfiguring stigma in sex work studies and beyond: Putting relationality to work

In the literature on prostitution/sex work, authors often acknowledge the ‘whore stigma’ as a key factor for sex workers’ position globally. Any genealogy of stigma theory, whether in the public health sciences or social sciences, begins with Goffman’s classic book Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity. That stigma has come to be a central concept in how sex work is analysed has simultaneously opened up for harm-reductive strategies and claims for rights while also reinforcing the idea that sex workers constitute a health risk to society and that sex work is pervasive in its negative effect on sex workers’ lives. This way of stereotyping sex sellers and downplaying diversity is characteristic of the use of stigma in sex work studies. While most of the authors emphasize one dimension of stigma more than others, none discusses a particular aspect regarding stigma in isolation; they all essentially address stigma as relational