Intersecting Dignities and Improvising Intimacies by Non-Chinese Women in Hong Kong's Sex Industry

Abstract

This presentation uses an intersectional lens to explore the diverse dignities that are recognized or expected of non-Chinese women in Hong Kong’s sex industry. Many of the 39 women that were interviewed for this study manage multiple precarious identities, such as former domestic workers, asylum seekers and irregular migrants. The supports available to this group cut across different civil society sectors, including organizations supporting sex workers, asylum seekers, domestic workers, trafficking survivors and ethnic minorities. It can be easily argued that all of these organizations aim to promote and protect the dignity of their beneficiaries or constituents, yet may have very diverse understandings of what constitutes dignity. This requires the women in this study to maintain careful management of identities and narratives as they engage with different organizations that reflect different dimensions of their identity. This is accomplished by tapping into moral resources and vocabularies of worth that bring to light their eligibility for services, while carefully keeping under control discrediting information. We conclude this presentation by proposing a model that would enable support of women with diverse identities, concerns and understandings of dignity.