‘Professional Girlfriends’

Awareness of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) among women who inject drugs in NYC: the importance of networks and syringe exchange programs for HIV prevention

“…The increased awareness suggests that WWID, who also engaged in transactional sex, may be educating themselves through their networks about PrEP. Research has shown sex worker networks to be organized and strong [34–36, 38, 80]. Additionally, research has demonstrated how women who sell sex, even when constrained by society and disadvantaged circumstances, found ways to assert their agency [38, 81–83].…”

Body Fluids and Fluid Bodies: Trans-Corporeal Connections in Contemporary German Narratives of Illness

“…Here, the film foregrounds pervasive gendered double-standards: While Sreykeo's sexuality as a "bar girl" is marginalized Ben's brother's adulterous affair with an office mate and his roommate's changing girlfriends are normalized as playful bohemian sexual practices (Buck 2010). In an ethnographic study of "bar girl" subculture in Cambodia, Heidi Hoefinger argues that these women tend to be stigmatized with labels of "broken women" or "prostitutes" because of their material desires (Hoefinger 2011). Yet, she demonstrates that they often engage in relationships more complex than simple "sex-for-cash" exchanges with "Western boyfriends"; they rather constitute "interplays between simultaneous pragmatic concerns and emotional desires, between intimate and gift-based sexual economies, and between 'cultural logics of love' and political economy" (Hoefinger 2011, p. 246).…”

Everyday articulations of prostitution: how some Filipina migrants in rural Japan describe sexual–economic relationships

“…First, I argue that when Filipina women in Central Kiso described Ruby's behavior as prostitution, they reworked understandings of it as involving commodified sexual exchange to accommodate the stigma attached to their migration and marriage histories and craft socially acceptable identities as wives and mothers in the rural region. I suggest that because so many Filipina wives in Central Kiso recognized that money and intimacy were intertwined in their lives, they did not categorize sexual -economic relationships like prostitution according to payment systems, as other scholars have assumed (Hunter 2002(Hunter , 2010Hoefinger 2011;Parreñas 2011;Peiss 1983;Zelizer 1989Zelizer , 2005. Rather, these women parsed such relationships according to the sentiments they identified as motivating them, which they believed were reflected in how one utilized gifts or money from a sexual partner and how one demonstrated appreciation of this financial support.…”

“…Other scholars question the cross-cultural applicability of even these terms for monetized sexual exchanges happening outside the USA and Western Europe (Cabezas 2009;Cheng 2010;Cole 2010;Hunter 2002;Hoefinger 2011;Wardlow 2004Wardlow , 2006. These scholars demonstrate that people involved in such practices do not identify as sex workers, and some scholars offer alternative expressions to capture these practices' diversity.…”

“…For instance, Hunter (2002Hunter ( , 2010 proposes the term 'transactional sex' as an alternative to 'prostitution' and 'sex work' that accommodates practices involving not only the direct exchange of sex acts for money but also, as in his African examples, more sustained sexual relationships centered on gift giving. Hoefinger (2011) suggests the term 'professional girlfriends' to refer to Cambodian women working in hostess bars in Phnom Penh who 'professionalize' the practice of exchanging intimacy for material benefits with Western men.…”