Sex and Stigma

An intimate and original look at the lives of Nevada’s legal sex workers through the voices of current and former employees, brothel owners, madams, and local law enforcement The state of Nevada is the only jurisdiction in the United States where prostitution is legal. Wrapped in moral judgments about sexual conduct and shrouded in titillating intrigue, stories about Nevada’s legal brothels regularly steal headlines. The stigma and secrecy pervading sex work contribute to experiences of oppression and unfair labor practices for many legal prostitutes in Nevada. Sex and Stigma engages with stories of women living and working in these “hidden” organizations to interrogate issues related to labor rights, secrecy, privacy, and discrimination in the current legal brothel system. Including interviews with current and former legal sex workers, brothel owners, madams, local police, and others, Sex and Stigma examines how widespread beliefs about the immorality of selling sexual services have influenced the history and laws of legal brothel prostitution. With unique access to a difficult-to-reach population, the authors privilege the voices of brothel workers throughout the book as they reflect on their struggles to engage in their communities, conduct business, maintain personal relationships, and transition out of the industry. Further, the authors examine how these brothels operate like other kinds of legal entities, and how individuals contend with balancing work and non-work commitments, navigate work place cultures, and handle managerial relationships. Sex and Stigma serves as a resource on the policies guiding legal prostitution in Nevada and provides an intimate look at the lived experiences of women performing sex work.

Sex and Stigmalays the groundwork for greater understanding of the everyday routines and work-life considerations of legal sex workers. This book is both significant and distinctive for the authors ability to take a phenomenon that typically is considered hidden and stigmatized and attach real faces, lives, workplace, and home issues to these women. Insightful and illuminating., Sex and Stigmais an engaging and informative book, blending first-person perspectives with feminist scholarship todemystify the brothel as a workplace. A smart and innovative study,readers will benefit fromthe authors blend of scholarly expertise, theirunique access to a difficult-to-reach population, and the inclusion of multiple sex workers perspectives., Pushing beyond the well-trod debate of whether prostitution should exist at all, the authors instead emphasize the issues of labor, stigma, secrecy, privacy, and discrimination within legal prostitution — issues that the authors rightly note are generally deemphasized in comparison with headline-grabbing news and analysis of the illegal sex trade., The valuable research presented by these authors [...] is leading to a more comprehensive understanding of the lives of women who work in this highly regulated form of sex work.

Sarah Jane Blithe is Associate Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno. Anna Wiederhold Wolfe is Assistant Professor of Organizational Communication at Texas A&M University. Breanna Mohr is an M.A. student at the University of Nevada, Reno. In addition to her education and research, Ms. Mohr works full time in a legal brothel.