Lewis Questions

Hi Lewis,

After much deliberation (and thanks to your feedback + talking to others about it) I have decided comfortable enough with pursuing sex work and the sex industry as my topic of exploration.  I do not think I will become too inhibited (although I might start that way).

I have done some reading and tried accumulate some thoughts on what aspects of sex work I find interesting, however I am still having difficulty formulating a core question.

Here is a list of topics within sex work I have found most interesting:

- anti-porn vs pro-porn feminism

- relationship between sex work research and corporate interests

- the rescue industry -- especially regarding things such as: “fallen women”, migrant workers + sex trafficking, magdalene laundries

- academic research vs common sense / emotional intelligence in sex work criticism

- polarization in sex work research

- sex work as a form of labour / sex worker’s rights

- relationship between free/stolen content and content aggregators (porn hub etc)

- manipulated sex work statistics to serve a cause

- personal experiences + needs of sex workers / importance of sex worker voices

And a list of questions I have written down while reading:

is pornography good for us

how does pornography effect us

how does the sex industry effect us

how does sex work impact society

how do anti and pro stances impact the sex industry

what is the “problem” with pornography

is there a threat to “healthy sexual development” in pornography

what is the effect of polarization in sex industry research

is porn harmful?

why do we need to research the sex industry?

is an unbiased approach to researching the sex industry possible?

why should sexual material be “offensive”

Out of these I feel the question that speaks most to what I am interested in exploring and provides the most opportunity for broad exploration is “Why do we need to research the sex industry?”

Does this question make sense as a starting point, should I try to pull it back a bit?  I am definitely open to going many directions in my exploration and could make a much longer list of areas of interest if I wasn’t trying to be reasonable.

In my pecha kucha, when introducing my topic, should I spend time defining what I mean by sex work and specify what aspects of it I am interested in?

Thanks again for your feedback, I am looking forward to starting class on Tuesday.

Cheers,

Josephine