The Role of Social Stigma in the Lives of Female-Identified Sex Workers: A Scoping Review

Abstract

From 2008 to 2018 research across the social sciences has burgeoned concerning sex work and social stigma. This paper employs a scoping review methodology to map scholarship produced during this period and develop a more coherent body of knowledge concerning the relationship between social stigma and female-identified sex workers. Twenty-six pieces of research related to sex work stigma are identified and reviewed from across the disciplines of sociology (n = 8), public health (n = 6), social work (n = 4), criminology (n = 2), psychology (n = 2), communications (n = 2), nursing (n = 1), and political science (n = 1). This scoping review identifies the main sources of sex-work stigma, the ways in which sex-work stigma manifests for sex workers, and stigma resistance strategies, as discussed in this body of literature. If, as theorists and researchers suggest, social stigma is at the foundation of the pernicious violence against sex workers, understanding the sources, manifestations, and resistance strategies of sex-work stigma is critical to countering and shifting this stigma. Findings include potential areas of research, policy, and practice to address and challenge sex-work stigma, recognizing that successful social transformation occurs in a dialectic between society’s socio-structural, community, and intrapersonal levels.