“I Will Not Be Dona Maria”: Rethinking Exploitation and Objectification in the Context of Work and Sex Work

Thaddeus Blanchette, Ana Paula Da Silva and Gustavo Camargo
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Thaddeus Blanchette: Instituto de Biodiversidade e Sustenabilidade, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Macaé 27965-045, Brazil
Ana Paula Da Silva: Eduação do Campo, Federal Fluminense University, Santo Antônio de Pâdua 20241-260, Brazil
Gustavo Camargo: Instituto de Biodiversidade e Sustenabilidade, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Macaé 27965-045, Brazil

Social Sciences, 2021, vol. 10, issue 6, 1-18

Abstract: In many feminist and sociological accounts of sex work, the concept of exploitation resides on the subjacent notion of objectification, codified in the omnipresent belief that the sex worker sells their body. Sexual objectification supposedly indicates the peculiar and particular effect that sex work is supposed to have on the bodies of human beings involved in this form of toil, being one of the keystones for the belief that sex work is inherently exploitative. In the present article, we intend to investigate the canonical concept of objectification and its (ab)uses in the light of a comparative ethnographic study of sex work and other jobs in the service economy in the cities of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) and New Orleans (USA). Our argument is that the concept of sexual objectification has its roots in pre-capitalist morality, encoded in Kantian philosophy, that is hardly applicable to real life in the 21st century. A more general and intersectional understanding of objectification and agency in the broader field of engendered labor relations is necessary for us to understand why people choose to engage in sex work, why laws which see sex work as synonymous with exploitation and slavery must be rethought, and how they might be rethought.

Keywords: sex work; exploitation; objectification; feminism; sociology of labor; Rio de Janeiro; New Orleans (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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