Ms Kate Hardy, BA (Shef) MRes (Liv)
PhD Student

Please feel free to contact me on k.hardy@qmul.ac.uk

Research interests:

I am a PhD student supervised by Jane Wills and Cathy McIlwaine. The working title of my research is entitled ‘Proletaría de La Vida: Organising Sex Workers in Argentina. Using a feminist collaborative comparative analysis, the research examines the political practice, subjective experiences and the spatial implications of sex worker organising. The thesis looks at the organising practices of sex workers in AMMAR, Argentina, focusing on the social conditions of street sex workers, the strategies they have employed to overcome marginalisation and the ways in which place influences social movement and trade union organising.

Previous studies have located sex worker organising (or the formation of ‘prostitutes collectives’) as a feature of civil society in the Global North (Jenness 1998; West 2000; Gall 2007, 2008). This study shifts the focus in order to examine the unfolding phenomenon in a country of the South, where sex work is an increasingly important element of economic survival for individuals, households and nation-states and where it has been arguably more successful. The research emphasises sex workers’ gendered agency in contrast to dominant discourses which deny sex workers’ subjectivity in defining, analysing and changing their reality. It challenges the pessimism which has surrounded academic analyses of sex worker organising and asks why it has been successful in Argentina.

Beyond sex work, my other academic interests include issues surrounding trade union organising, informal work, women's movements, gender, agency and resistance.

Publications:

Hardy, K. (2010 forthcoming) ‘Making Space for Emotion in Development Methodologies’ Emotion, Space and Society.

Hardy, K. (2010 forthcoming) 'If you shut up, they kill you: sex worker resistance in Argentina' in New Dimensions in Sex Work Research Hardy, K., Kingston, S. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (Ashgate).

Hardy, K., Kingston, S. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2010) New Dimensions in Sex Work Research in (Ashgate).

Hardy, K. (2010 forthcoming) ‘Book Review: Rai, S. (2008) The Gender Politics of Development: Essays in Hope and Despair’ Journal of International Development.

Hardy, K. (2009 forthcoming) ‘(Sex) Working Class Subjects: Integrating Sex Workers in the Argentine Labour Movement’, International Labour and Working Class History 77.

Hardy, K. (2008) ‘Blind children are right to learn’ The Guardian, 22/11/08.

Hardy, K. (2008) ‘Sex Workers Unite!’ Developments 41 (DfID, London).

Hardy, K. (2008) ‘Despite marginalisation and violence sex workers are leading the way on HIV/AID prevention’ Guardian Online http://www.guardian.co.uk/journalismcompetition/change.in.argentina

Hardy, K. (2007) ‘Rethinking Action: Negotiations of Space and the Body in the Struggle of AMMAR’ Gunnarsson, L., Jonasdottir, A. and Karlson, G. (eds.) GExcel Working Paper: Volume II Theme I Gender, Sexuality and Global Change (Örebro University, Sweden).

Publications under review

Hardy, K. ‘A Touch of Class: Bodywork and the Stigma of Sex Work’ Body and Society (invited to special issue on BodyWork)

Hardy, K. ‘Book Review: Zheng, T Red Lights: The Lives of Sex Workers in Postsocialist China’ Gender, Place and Culture.

Hardy, K. ‘Book Review: Katsulis, Y. Sex Work and the City’ Journal of Latin American Studies.

Conference Papers and Talks

Hardy, K. (2009) Sexthics: Bridging the activist-academy dichotomy in sex work research, Brighton and Sussex Sexualities Network Conference, University of Brighton, September.

Hardy, K. (2009) ‘Towards a Labour Geography of Sex Work’ Labour Geographies Conference, University of Liverpool, June.

Hardy, K. (2009) (Sex) Working Class Subjects: Integrating Sex Workers in the Argentine Labour Movement, Centre for Women and Work, Rutgers, State University of New Jersey, May 2009.

Hardy, K. (2009) 'If you shut up, they'll kill you: sex worker resistance in Argentina' Postgraduate Conference on Sex Work, Leeds University, January 2009.

Hardy, K. (2009) ‘New Paths in Sex Worker Organising' Bodywork ESRC Seminar Series January 2009.

Hardy, K. (2008) ‘Organising new, informal and clandestine workers: lessons from Argentina’ ORGANISE! 2008 London Organising Network Conference October 2008.

Hardy, K. (2007) ‘Rewriting the street: AMMAR’s strategies of resistance in Argentina’ 5th International Conference of Critical Geography, Mumbai, India.