Description
Book SynopsisAn ethnographic case study of sex tourism in the Dominican Republic, showing how the sex trade is linked to economic and cultural globalization
Trade Review“A smart, timely, eye-opening account.
What’s Love Got To Do with It? makes both men’s and women’s hopes and strategies visible. It underscores poor women’s capacity for agency and internationalized thinking without portraying the international system of commercialized sexuality as one in which women and men are meeting on a level playing field.”—Cynthia Enloe, author of
The Morning After: Sexual Politics at the End of the Cold War“In this finely hued ethnography, Denise Brennan questions how transnationalization gets transacted, imagined, and experienced through an examination of the sex trade in a specific locale, Sosúa in Dominican Republic. Interweaving the grand themes of political economy and power inequities with those of desire and fantasy—and from the sides of both (foreign) customer and (local) sex worker—she has crafted a richly textured study of a ‘sexscape’ and its brokering of dreams as much as of money and sex.”—Anne Allison, author of
Nightwork: Sexuality, Pleasure, and Corporate Masculinity in a Tokyo Hostess Club“An impressive ethnographic study and important contribution to research on Latin America. . . .
What’s Love Got to Do With It?, written in plain language and a narrative style, lacks academic jargon and is accessible for a diverse audience. . . .
What’s Love Got to Do With It? . . . works to break down simplistic binary ways of thinking about the global sex industry to reveal an extremely complicated transnational industry.” -- Emily Van der Meulen * International Feminist Journal of Politics *
“This is a readable ethnography which should interest many scholars on race, gender, and migration. It introduces this under-explored area through rich and accessible photographic and fieldwork data.” -- Jinthana Haritaworn * Ethnic and Racial Studies *
"Brennan’s writing is clear and engaging. . . .
What’s Love Got to Do With It? is a book that offers profound insights into women’s work, sexual commerce, international tourism, and the global economy. It is essential reading for scholars and students of gender, sexuality, and political economy in Latin America." -- Patty Kelly * American Anthropologist *
Table of ContentsAbout the Series ix
Acknowledgments
xi
Introduction: Elena and Jurgen 1
I. The Town
1. Sosua: A Transnational Tow 13
2. Imagining and Experiencing Sosua
51
II. The Transnational Plan: Looking Beyond Dominican Borders
3. Performing Love 91
III. The Sex Trade
4. Sosua’s Sex Workers: Their Families and Working Lives 119
5. Advancement Strategies in Sosua’s Sex Trade
154
IV. Plan Accomplished: Getting Beyond Dominican Borders
6. Transnational Disappointments: Living in Europe 185
Conclusion: Changes in Sex Workers’ Lives, Sosua, and Its Sex Trade 207
Notes 221
Glossary
245
Bibliography 249
Index 273
