Treading water: Street sex workers negotiating frantic presents and speculative futures in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam

Structural conditions shape the temporalities that govern the lives of street sex workers operating in Châu Đốc, a small town in Southern Vietnam. These women live each day as they come and make decisions based on quick returns and the management of daily needs, prioritizing short-term solutions over planning for the future. The ethnographic study of the multiple temporalities that govern street sex work, family care, gambling and debt-juggling practices shows that these women live in a frantic present-oriented temporality that is filled with pressing tasks and routines. This leads to an uncertain future that engenders various forms of hopeful and speculative behaviour, but precludes systematic planning. As a result, these women are treading water: putting effort into keep themselves afloat but never furthering their status and lives or catching up with the currents of development and progress. Overall, this article argues that this day-to-day lifestyle goes hand in hand with the linear and future-oriented time of capitalism and wage-labour that has infiltrated everyday life in post-reform Vietnam.

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Female street sex work in Belgrade as risk environment for a syndemic production: A qualitative study

Srpski arhiv za celokupno lekarstvo ◽

10.2298/sarh161213102z ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 145 (11-12) ◽

pp. 611-617

Author(s):

Bojan Zikic ◽

Milos Milenkovic

Keyword(s):

Social Environment ◽

Sex Work ◽

Sex Workers ◽

Ethnographic Study ◽

Medical Conditions ◽

Risk Environment ◽

Environment Factors ◽

The Social ◽

Street Sex Work ◽

Syndemic Theory

Introduction/Objective. Although female street sex workers are contextually vulnerable to numerous health-endangering factors, they also contribute in re-producing them. This synergetic production is approached by syndemic theory developed within medical anthropology. The objective of the study is to present an analysis of the results of a qualitative ethnographic study conducted in Belgrade, Serbia in 2015, and reflect upon social environment factors influencing syndemic development of medical conditions. Methods. The risk environment factors enhancing possibilities of developing particular medical conditions were investigated by applying qualitative anthropological methodology, emphasizing semi-structured in-depth interviews, a standard qualitative sample, and respondents? self-reporting. Results. Social environment of sex work, generally considered risky due to sexually and blood-transmitted diseases, in this study also proved as receptive for many other illnesses, whose syndemic character has been insufficiently addressed. The study confirmed the syndemic nature of street sex work. Conclusion. The social science perspective should be used in health policy conceptualization and implementation not only during latter stages, i.e. in the interpretation of the social conditions influencing medical related issues, but during early stages of understanding how those conditions and issues circularly constitute each other.

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An ethnographic study of HIV/AIDS among Ayoreo sex workers: cultural factors and risk perception

Journal of Clinical Nursing ◽

10.1111/jocn.12336 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 22 (23-24) ◽

pp. 3337-3348 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Olga M López-Entrambasaguas ◽

José Granero-Molina ◽

Cayetano Fernández-Sola

Keyword(s):

Risk Perception ◽

Sex Workers ◽

Cultural Factors ◽

Ethnographic Study ◽

Hiv Aids

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Seeing the collective: family arrangements for care at home for older people with dementia

Ageing and Society ◽

10.1017/s0144686x17001477 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 39 (06) ◽

pp. 1200-1218 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

CHRISTINE CECI ◽

HOLLY SYMONDS BROWN ◽

MARY ELLEN PURKIS

Keyword(s):

Family Care ◽

High Volume ◽

Ethnographic Study ◽

Family Carers ◽

Care Giving ◽

People With Dementia ◽

Home Based ◽

Health And Social Care ◽

Care At Home ◽

At Home

ABSTRACTWith the predicted growth in the number of people with dementia living at home across the globe, the need for home-based care is expected to increase. As such, it will be primarily family carers who will provide this crucial support to family members. Designing appropriate support for family carers is thus essential to minimise risks to their health, to prevent premature institutionalisation or poor care for persons with dementia, as well as to sustain the effective functioning of health and social care systems. To date, the high volume of research related to care at home and acknowledged low impact of interventions suggests that a re-examination of the nature of care at home, and how we come to know about it, is necessary if we are to advance strategies that will contribute to better outcomes for families. This paper describes findings from an ethnographic study that was designed to support an analysis of the complexity and materiality of family care arrangements – that is, the significance of the actual physical, technological and institutional elements shaping care-giving situations. In this paper, we describe the arrangements made by one family to show the necessary collectivity of these arrangements, and the consequences of the formal care system's failure to respond to these.

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Family and Family-Like Relations for Transnational Migrants: Ideals of Care Informed by Kin, Non-Family, and Religion

Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences ◽

10.1177/0739986320937435 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 42 (3) ◽

pp. 344-362

Author(s):

Elizabeth Bingham Thomas ◽

Carolyn Smith-Morris

Keyword(s):

Social Networks ◽

Family Formation ◽

Family Care ◽

Ethnographic Study ◽

Transnational Families ◽

Church Members ◽

Transnational Family ◽

Transnational Migrants ◽

Care Relationships ◽

The U.S

Studies of transnational family formation and care relationships suggest that, while family forms and care values are idealized, they are also negotiated, enacted, and fluid constructs. Strategies of resilience and mechanisms of flexible care achieved by transnational families are fine-tuned under multiple influences. Among these influences are well-known sources such as social networks, as well as less well-understood sources such as religious teachings. We report findings of a 4-month, ethnographic study among Latinx immigrants to the U.S. whose ( n = 14) narratives of family “care” reflect their ideals and simultaneously work to linguistically produce role continuity. Thematic results address three key strategies for achieving this continuity: (1) valuations of flexibility; (2) family-like care by non-family and church members; and (3) commitments to and reliance on new networks, particularly through church relations. We conclude by suggesting how family-like care, such as that from church relations, informs the flexible relational obligations, resources, resiliencies, and values of transnational migrants.

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Anti-Social Powers and the Regulation of Street Sex Work

Social Policy and Society ◽

10.1017/s1474746409990236 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

pp. 101-109 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Tracey Sagar

Keyword(s):

Social Network ◽

Social Behavior ◽

Sex Work ◽

Sex Workers ◽

Knowledge Gap ◽

Network Research ◽

Public Nuisance ◽

Street Sex Work ◽

The Impact

This article focuses on the use of anti-social behavior powers in relation to a group of vulnerable women – street sex workers. It illustrates how the use of legal tools – anti-social behavior orders and public nuisance injunctions – against sex workers has been both misplaced and ineffective. The article also considers the use of anti-social powers in light of the government's leaning towards the coercive (or some might argue the compulsory) rehabilitation of sex workers. In doing so, it draws attention to the lack of research on the impact of both exclusion orders and rehabilitation orders for sex workers. Whilst it is important to fill this knowledge gap, it is argued that future investigations in this area would benefit from social network research approaches.

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Correlation Between HIV and Sexual Behavior, Drug Use, Trichomoniasis and Candidiasis Among Female Sex Workers in a Mekong Delta Province of Vietnam

AIDS and Behavior ◽

10.1007/s10461-008-9499-5 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 13 (5) ◽

pp. 873-880 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

Thuong Vu Nguyen ◽

Nghia Van Khuu ◽

Phong Hoai Truong ◽

Anh Phuong Nguyen ◽

Lien Xuan Thi Truong ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sexual Behavior ◽

Drug Use ◽

Sex Workers ◽

Female Sex Workers ◽

Mekong Delta ◽

Female Sex

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Iraqi Refugees in the United States

10.18574/nyu/9781479873944.001.0001 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Ken R. Crane

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Terrorist Attack ◽

The United States ◽

Ethnographic Study ◽

Iraqi Refugees ◽

Inland Empire ◽

The Us ◽

Communal Expression ◽

Human Cost ◽

Work Family

There are numerous and trenchant accounts of the tragic and disastrous Iraq War (2003–2011), which focus on its financial, human, and political cost to the US. Less has been written about the human cost to the Iraqi people in the largest displacement in the Middle East since 1948. Few Americans are cognizant that over three million Iraqis, many facing violence due to their cooperation with the US invasion and occupation, fled Iraq and that 124,159 were resettled in the US from 2008 to 2015 after an intense lobbying effort by former aid personnel and veterans. This ethnographic study explores the cartography of belonging for Iraqi refugees within a specific cultural geography—California’s Latinx-majority communities of southeastern California (known as the Inland Empire). The fieldwork in the IE spans a particular geopolitical era of resettlement mobilization, the Great Recession, and the December 2, 2015, terrorist attack in San Bernardino. The attack was immediately followed by candidate Donald Trump’s naming of Arab and Muslim refugees (including Iraqis) as threats to national security. With the mainstreaming of Islamophobia during the presidential election, the United States ceased to be a free space of religious and communal expression. Drawing on seven years of fieldwork with fifty Iraqi refugees, this book is a witness to how the felt sense of belonging—cultural citizenship—is negotiated within the social spaces of work, family, faith community.

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Young men doing business: Male bar prostitution in Berlin and Prague

Sexualities ◽

10.1177/1363460717708139 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 21 (8) ◽

pp. 1389-1408 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Graham Ellison ◽

Ronald Weitzer

Keyword(s):

Sex Workers ◽

Spatial Location ◽

Ethnographic Study ◽

Male Sex Workers ◽

Individual Level ◽

Doing Business ◽

The Social ◽

Micro Level ◽

The Individual ◽

Sexual Commerce

Studies of male sex workers are often confined to the individual level rather than exploring their work environment per se or the larger ecological context in which their business activities are embedded. We know relatively little, for example, about the spatial location of erotic worksites (apart from street-level work) or the interactional dynamics of sellers and clients within such settings. This article presents an ethnographic study of bars and clubs in Prague and Berlin where male sexual commerce is transacted. We find important differences between the cities in the social organization of the bars and in participants’ demographic characteristics. The analysis links our micro-level findings to the larger forces of labour migration and sex tourism, factors that differ between the two cases.

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“Nothing Short of a Horror Show”: Triggering Abjection of Street Workers in Western Canadian Newspapers

Hypatia ◽

10.1111/j.1527-2001.2011.01256.x ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 28 (1) ◽

pp. 142-162 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Caitlin Janzen ◽

Susan Strega ◽

Leslie Brown ◽

Jeannie Morgan ◽

Jeannine Carrière

Keyword(s):

Sex Work ◽

Sex Workers ◽

Media Coverage ◽

Judith Butler ◽

Newspaper Coverage ◽

Discursive Practices ◽

Analytic Framework ◽

The Past ◽

Foucauldian Analysis ◽

Street Sex Work

Over the past decade, Canadian media coverage of street sex work has steadily increased. The majority of this interest pertains to graphic violence against street sex workers, most notably from Vancouver, British Columbia. In this article, the authors analyze newspaper coverage that appeared in western Canadian publications between 2006 and 2009. In theorizing the violence both depicted and perpetrated by newspapers, the authors propose an analytic framework capable of attending to the process of othering in all of its complexity. To this end, the authors supplement a Foucauldian analysis of abjection by considering the work of Judith Butler along with Julia Kristeva's conceptualization of abjection. Using excerpts from western Canadian newspapers, the authors illustrate how the media's discursive practices function as triggers for the process of cultural abjection by inscribing street sex workers with images of defilement. The authors argue that newspaper coverage of street sex workers reinforces the inviolability of normalized life by constantly reiterating the horror reserved for abjected bodies.

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