Sex workers and unionism: the case of the Associação Mulheres Guerreiras and the CUT of Campinas

• Grant number: 22/04240-5
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Start date: November 01, 2022
• End date: January 28, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Sociology
• Principal Investigator: Paula Regina Pereira Marcelino
• Grantee: Maria Laura Arantes Bessa Ferreira
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated scholarship(s): 23/15413-0 - Sex work in feminist sociological theory, BE.EP.MS

Abstract

For over 30 years, the organized movement of sex workers has broadened and challenged classical conceptions of labor by saying that, under capitalism, prostitution is a possible form of work. With this project we propose an exploratory investigation of the Associação Mulheres Guerreiras, a collective of sex workers based in the city of Campinas (SP), and its insertion in the struggle for so-called labor rights. We understand that its close relationship with the largest union entity in Brazil, the Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT), conforms a very particular and fruitful situation for: 1) know what these women think about their living and working conditions; 2) understand how their political practices and their platform of demands are constructed; 3) analyze how the political practice of these women impacts the CUT, its deliberations, documents, public positions regarding prostitution and women union members of other professional groups; 4) prescribe how the phenomenon of the political organization of prostitutes impacts the theoretical understanding of fundamental sociological categories such as work and class. Our main research hypothesis is that the Women Warriors Association behaves in some senses like a trade union, sharing practices and configurations with trade unionism as a social movement. We will use qualitative research techniques: direct observation of meetings and public events of the entities; document analysis and semi-structured interviews with leaders and militants. We intend to contribute, with our case study, to the debate on sex work on the rise in the field of Sociology.