Sex work, identity and space occupation in the downtown of Belo Horizonte, Brazil

This article aims to discuss the relationship between gender, identity, work and territory among women who work as sex workers in the central area of Belo Horizonte. We sought to think if and in what measure the construction of a professional identity can contribute to the empowerment of these women in the sense of favoring an organization that allows them to demand among other question, their permanency in this area that has been historically a territory of prostitution in the city.  Despite this historical occupation by sex workers, this is a region that has always been targeted by urban planning policies that sought “to clean” the area, removing from there the hotels and pension where those women sell their services. So, if sex workers are seen as hierarchically inferior, in the sense employed by Rubin’s definition of sexual hierarchy, and therefore, stigmatized, the idea that they have to be “rescued” or at least hidden is a very common one, as well as the proposal to remove prostitutes from the downtown of large urban areas.  However, in Belo Horizonte these proposals never went ahead and they still are in the area, in spite the fact that there is a huge project to revitalize the central area in consonant with the preparations for the World Cup in two years. Today, there are in the region around twenty hotels where almost two thousand women work daily. Hence, our discussion if in this area of the city, the construction and maintenance of their identities as prostitutes − identity that implies in the sharing of meanings about their profession, gender and of a space − would contribute to their political organization face to the “other”, non-sex workers.