The Massage Establishments Scandal: Coding and De-coding Sex Work at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

By Jessica Gregory Sexual Labour

The late-Victorian massage parlour and its promotions became a site of moralistic concern, but could its ambiguous intentions be de-coded?

Squirming in the Dark: Playful Occupations for Sex Workers in the 1870 Census

By Holly Marquess Archives of Desire, Sexual Labour

Uncovering the playful occupations listed for sex workers in the 1870 census.

Love for Sale: Representing Prostitution in Imperial Russia

By Colleen Lucey Modern Europe, NOTCHES on the Bookshelf, Sexual Labour

How was prostitution represented in Imperial Russia?

Wolfenden’s Women: Prostitution in Post-war Britain

By Julia Laite NOTCHES on the Bookshelf, Sexual Labour, United Kingdom

How was prostitution presented in the Wolfenden Report?

Prostitution and Subjectivity in Late Medieval Germany

By Jamie Page Medieval, NOTCHES on the Bookshelf, Sexual Labour

What was life like for the women who worked in medieval brothels?

Constructing the Pornographic Object of Knowledge

By Whitney Strub 20th and 21st Century United States, NOTCHES on the Bookshelf, Sexual Labour

Contemporary pornography has become a massive archive of sexual scripts. To some extent pornography has replaced sexology, psychoanalysis and sex manuals as a form of knowledge about sexuality.

‘An Equality of Injustice’: The Sex Buyers’ Bill and Lessons from History

By Julia Laite Sexual Labour, Sexual Violence, United Kingdom

Sex workers living under these regimes have to keep selling sex in a climate made significantly more hostile by further criminalization.