“In the Suitcase was a Boy”: Representing Transnational Child Trafficking in Contemporary Crime Fiction

Charlotte Beyer

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-78214-0_4

Abstract

This chapter investigates representations of transnational child trafficking in contemporary crime fiction, focusing specifically on the depiction of child trafficking and its victims. Beyer examines the role of crime fiction in raising reader awareness of human trafficking and of the child victims’ predicament and plight, considering didactic dimensions of the genre and how it tends to erase victims in the aftermath of crime. Through detailed examinations of representations of child trafficking and its social and cultural contexts in selected post-2000 British and Scandinavian crime fiction texts, the chapter argues that crime fiction can be seen to engage explicitly in public and private debates around human trafficking, and, through its popular outreach, has the potential to affect popular perceptions of human trafficking and its victims.

Highlights

Exploring Representations of Child TraffickingSince the agreement of the Palermo Protocol in 2000, there has been an increased interest in the topic of transnational human trafficking, in in the news media, and in documentary programmes and crime fiction (Gregoriou & Ras, 2018; Dearey, 2018).1 This growing awareness of human trafficking has recently resulted in academic research into its representation
While offering a number of articles examining the subject of the representation of human trafficking, the Anti-Trafficking Review issue included no examinations of crime fiction, or literary fiction
Works like those by Schepp, Walters, and Dugdall appear to be the exception in the growing body of popular literature portraying human trafficking, in their sustained narrative focus on the trafficked child’s experience and trauma

Summary

Introduction

Since the agreement of the Palermo Protocol in 2000, there has been an increased interest in the topic of transnational human trafficking, in in the news media, and in documentary programmes and crime fiction (Gregoriou & Ras, 2018; Dearey, 2018). This growing awareness of human trafficking has recently resulted in academic research into its representation. Since the agreement of the Palermo Protocol in 2000, there has been an increased interest in the topic of transnational human trafficking, in in the news media, and in documentary programmes and crime fiction (Gregoriou & Ras, 2018; Dearey, 2018).1 This growing awareness of human trafficking has recently resulted in academic research into its representation. Crime fiction enjoys a wide readership, and the representations generated by these books can potentially have a significant impact on public awareness of TCT It is, pertinent to investigate portrayals of TCT in crime fiction, in order to analyse and understand these fictional representations and their effect, and to understand the social, cultural, and literary contexts for those representations. Through a critical analysis of depictions of TCT in crime fiction, this chapter identifies clichéd narrative patterns that frequently occur in crime fiction treating the subject of child trafficking, as well as tracing those representations that offer more complex and nuanced portrayals of TCT victims, their agency, resilience, and survival

Methodology and Context

Conclusion