From Concubines to Prostitutes. A Partial History of Trade in Sexual Services in Indonesia
The history of sex work in Indonesia is filled with contradictions and conflicts. Women from poor families were recruited by nobles to take the position of concubines to serve the twin roles of domestic and sexual servants. Foreign traders, soldiers and officials also exploited the opportunity to re...
Gardado en:
| Publicado en: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/moussons, |
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| Autor Principal: | |
| Formato: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Idioma: | Anglais |
| Publicado: |
Moussons
2017
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| Acceso en liña: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Résumé: | The history of sex work in Indonesia is filled with contradictions and conflicts. Women from poor families were recruited by nobles to take the position of concubines to serve the twin roles of domestic and sexual servants. Foreign traders, soldiers and officials also exploited the opportunity to recruit poor women to maintain temporary households, and petty officials took on the role of pimps to organize sex workers for increasingly commercialised operations. The complaints of religious leaders from both the Christian churches of the colonisers and the Islamic and Hindu believers among indigenous people put pressure on the state to regulate or forbid sex work, largely unsuccessfully. In a detailed review of the history of prostitution up to the end of the New Order this article traces the transformation of sex work from a largely socially acceptable practice into a widely condemned, but begrudgingly accepted social reality. |
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