Culture, Health and Sexuality
Volume 15, Issue 2, 2013, Pages 191-204

Identity management, negotiation and resistance among women in the sex trade in London, Ontario (Article)

Orchard T.* , Farr S. , Macphail S. , Wender C. , Young D.
  • a Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Western Ontario, London, Canada
  • b Community Mental Health Services, Western Ontario Therapeutic Community Hostel, London, Canada
  • c Community Mental Health Services, Western Ontario Therapeutic Community Hostel, London, Canada
  • d Community Mental Health Services, Western Ontario Therapeutic Community Hostel, London, Canada
  • e Community Mental Health Services, Western Ontario Therapeutic Community Hostel, London, Canada

Abstract

Sex work, and ideas about women in the trade, have long been represented as tragic and/or threatening. However, such portrayals tell us very little about how women think about themselves and the kinds of work they do. The data for this paper come from an ethnographic, community-based study in London, Ontario, that involves women in street-based, indoor and transactional sex work. This discussion focuses on how women develop different individual identities, including the management of multiple selves, their sexual identities and what we have termed the 'good junkie' identity. We also examine how these women employ aspects of dominant representation of sex workers, namely the low status accorded to those in street-based work and the defamatory term 'whore' or 'ho', when negotiating the moral hierarchies that exist within various kinds of sex work (i.e., stripping, massage parlours) and making sense of their professional and personal lives. The work that goes into the creation and maintenance of the women's divergent identities sheds important light on this complicated and tremendously demanding, yet inadequately understood, aspect of life as women in the sex trade. © 2013 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

Author Keywords

Sex work Resistance Women Identity Canada

Index Keywords

Canada female Humans Negotiating self concept prostitution psychological aspect Ontario qualitative research Article interpersonal communication Social Identification human adult social behavior middle aged
Link
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84872410565&doi=10.1080%2f13691058.2012.750760&partnerID=40&md5=be605d363a174f9918f4fda233acd76f
DOI: 10.1080/13691058.2012.750760
ISSN: 13691058
Cited by: 12
Original Language: English