Dilemmas of double roles: doing research and social work in street-based prostitution

In my dissertation project I conducted ethnographic research on Hungarian sex workers living in Berlin. While doing ethnography at this field site, I was employed at a social service providing agency in the outdoor prostitution area. In my research project I discuss questions related to ethnicity, class and gender. Therefore reflecting on my position in the field regarding these inequalities and looking at my relationship with the research subjects is highly important. In my presentation I analyze the particularity of having double roles in the field and explain how it effected my connection to the sex workers and their boyfriends/procurers and how this defines my research and narrative. I bring personal experiences about the insider/outsider dilemmas, the ways I approached ethnic identity and gender norms in the field and the ethical and methodological issues I had to face with. Thereby I critically engage with the aims of social work in the field of sex work and reflect on my role as being non-Roma, a middle class woman and a co-worker at a social agency and the power relations this indicates. Being present in three different layers in the field, I provide a complex tandem ethnography (Molland 2013, 2014) by analyzing the social practices in the field, the work of the “helping industry” (Agustin 2004), and the academic discourse on trafficking and sex work research (Bernstein 2010, 2014). Bibliography: Agustín, Laura María. 2004. Alternate Ethics, or: Telling Lies to Researchers. Research for Sex Work, June 2004, 6-7. Bernstein, Elisabeth. 2010. Militarized Humanitarianism Meets Carceral Feminism: The Politics of Sex, Rights, and Freedom in Contemporary Antitrafficking Campaigns. Journal of Women in Culture and Society 2010, vol. 36, no. 1. Bernstein, Elizabeth and Shih, Elena. 2014. The Erotics of Authenticity: Sex Trafficking and “Reality Tourism” in Thailand. Social Politics 2014. Sverre Molland. 2013. Tandem ethnography: On researching ‘trafficking’ and ‘anti-trafficking’. Ethnography 14(3) 300–323. Sverre Molland. 2014. In search of the perfect method. Reflections on knowing, seeing, measuring and estimating human trafficking. In: HumanTrafficking in Asia: Forcing issues. Ed. Sallie Yeila. Rouledge: London and New York. 101-117