Treading water

Street sex workers negotiating frantic presents and speculative futures in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam

Datos Bibliográficos

ID4356152
AutoresNicolas Lainez (0000-0001-6314-275X, Institut de Recherche Interdisciplinaire sur les Enjeux Sociaux, autor de correspondencia)
Año2019
Volumen28
Número2
Páginas804-827
Fecha de publicación2019-05-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaTime & Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0961-463X • E-ISSN: 1461-7463
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0961463x18778473
OpenAlexW2810938038
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas6
Referencias citadas42

Structural conditions shape the temporalities that govern the lives of street sex workers operating in Châu Đốc, a small town in Southern Vietnam. These women live each day as they come and make decisions based on quick returns and the management of daily needs, prioritizing short-term solutions over planning for the future. The ethnographic study of the multiple temporalities that govern street sex work, family care, gambling and debt-juggling practices shows that these women live in a frantic present-oriented temporality that is filled with pressing tasks and routines. This leads to an uncertain future that engenders various forms of hopeful and speculative behaviour, but precludes systematic planning. As a result, these women are treading water: putting effort into keep themselves afloat but never furthering their status and lives or catching up with the currents of development and progress. Overall, this article argues that this day-to-day lifestyle goes hand in hand with the linear and future-oriented time of capitalism and wage-labour that has infiltrated everyday life in post-reform Vietnam

Business · Capitalism · Ethnography · Everyday life · Futures contract · Mekong delta · Negotiation · Political science · Politics · Social science · Sociology · Temporalities · Temporality · Gender Studies · Sex work and related issues · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies