T he CSC Sex Worker Media Library is a database of videos by
and about sex workers from around the world, created with the
goal of preserving sex worker culture and discourse. The library
is located on-site at CSC and available for viewing by application
only. Project director Carol Leigh explains, “This resource
is designed to assist researchers, scholars and activists (including
sex workers) in their efforts to understand and support sex
workers rights and culture. This resource is sorely needed as
we survive in a world of stigma, discrimination and criminalization.”
Library categories includes art and performance documentation;
political demonstrations, marches and street theater; festival
films by and about sex workers; interviews/oral histories of
sex workers and allies; and documentation from conferences around
the world.
The CSC Sex Worker Media Library is funded by a grant from the
Creative Work Fund, a San Francisco foundation that supports
collaborations between Bay Area artists and nonprofit organizations.
The Creative Work Fund's highly competitive awards celebrate
the role of artists as problem solvers and the making of art
as a profound contribution to intellectual inquiry and to the
strengthening of communities. According to Creative Work Fund
Director Frances Phillips, grant recipients, "...push artistic
boundaries, benefit social and medical services, and reflect
the vibrancy and vitality of the Bay Area."
“This is an essential resource because so much of the
history of sex worker activism is on video and not in print,”
adds SWML advisor Dr. Melinda Chateauvert, a historian at the
University of Maryland.
“We are very honored to be able to house these important
materials,” says Center for Sex & Culture Executive
Director, Dr. Carol Queen. “The Creative Work Fund award
our project received reflects respect for sex workers within
the arts communities and a recognition of the valuable cultural
contributions made by sex workers.”
In sharp contrast, our communities have been subject to a new
wave of repression. George Gascon, the newly appointed San Francisco
police chief is proposing policies which further punish sex
workers and their clients, despite strong support in the 2008
elections for a referendum to decriminalize sex work.
“The CSC Sex Worker Media Library is a crucial resource
to preserve and encourage the courageous efforts by the community
of sex workers in San Francisco, and around the world who resist
this oppression as they survive,” says SWML Project Manger
and University of California (Davis) instructor, Katrina Fullman.
San Francisco has been central to the development of the international
sex worker rights movement. The city's unique history as ‘the
Barbary Coast’ set the stage. The sex workers movement
began in the early 70s gaining national attention with the founding
of COYOTE by Margo St. James. The First National Hookers Convention
took place in San Francisco in 1973 at Glide Church. CSC Sex
Worker Media Library creator, Carol Leigh, coined the term ‘sex
worker’ in San Francisco in 1978. Bay Area sex workers,
activists and educators inspired and sustain the international
political and social sex workers rights movement including:
Margo St. James, Annie Sprinkle, Robyn Few, Susie Bright, Gloria
Lockett, Rachel West, Tamara Ching, Priscilla Alexander, Carol
Queen, Victoria Schneider, Johanna Breyer, Joseph Kramer, Dawn
Passar and many more.
Many performers and musicians from the Bay Area have earned
their living as dancers, phone sex operators, prostitutes, dominatrixes,
adult film actors and models. Documentation of festivals, performance
and cabaret events includes Jennifer Blowdryer's ‘SmutFest,’
Dee Dee Russell's ‘Anti-Fashion’ events, Tallulah
Bankheist's ‘Whore Church,’ Annie Oakley's ‘Sex
Worker Art Show Tour,’ and SF Sex Worker Festival performances
like ‘Lick My Kitty’ (after the deceased Kitty Kastro),
Mariko Passion's ‘Whore-A-Palooza’ and Kirk Read's
‘Army of Lovers.’
Conference documentation includes a wide range of international
sex worker rights conferences from ISWFACE/Los Angeles COYOTE's
1997 ‘International Conference on Prostitution,’
the ICRSE ‘European Conference on Sex Work, Human Rights,
Labour and Migration,’ Desiree Alliance conferences including
‘Re-visioning Prostitution Policy: Creating Space for
Sex Worker Rights and Challenging Criminalization,’ Ziteng
of Hong Kong's ‘Out In The Sun-Legal Constraints and Possibilities
in Protecting the Rights of Sex Workers,’ COSWAS of Taiwan's
‘First International Action Forum for Sex work Rights’
and many more. International resources include sexworkerspresent.blip.tv
and Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee at durbar.org.
Access to the video materials is location based at San Francisco's
Center for Sex & Culture. Applications are available online
for on-site access to these collections. Please fill out
this online
application to request on site access to our library
.
