Motherhood and intimate relationships of female sex workers in Slovenia

Magistrsko delo obravnava materinstvo in partnerske odnose žensk, ki so ponudnice spolnih storitev v Sloveniji. Seksualne delavke v vlogi matere in partnerke močno odstopajo od »ideala« ženske, kakršnega narekujejo družbena pričakovanja, kar pred njih postavlja izzive, povezane z usklajevanjem različnih socialnih vlog. V teoretičnem uvodu delo obravnava širši družbeno-politični kontekst prostitucije, vključujoč razlago različnih regulatornih praks in diskurzivnih vidikov, ki pomembno sodoločajo konstituiranje socialnih in spolnih vlog. V nadaljevanju se osredotoča na pojasnjevanje družbene determiniranosti teh vlog (s poudarkom na materinski vlogi) skozi teorijo socialnega konstrukcionizma, ki v pričujočem delu predstavlja temelj razlage ženskosti, materinstva in razmerij zasebnosti. Namen empirične raziskave je preveriti, kako ženske, ki ponujajo spolne storitve, opredeljujejo različne socialne vloge, kako doživljajo njihovo prepletanje z vlogo seksualne delavke ter kakšne strategije razvijejo za premagovanje ambivalentnosti teh vlog. Da bi proučevano tematiko razumeli kompleksneje, je uporabljen kombiniran raziskovalni pristop z metodološko triangulacijo. Vzorec zajema 22 seksualnih delavk ter 4 strokovne delavke iz različnih vladnih in nevladnih socialno-varstvenih organizacij. Ugotovitve kažejo, da je področje partnerstva v primerjavi z materinstvom bolj nekompatibilno seksualnemu delu, kar napeljuje k dejstvu, da ženske vlogo seksualne delavke lažje in bolj uspešno usklajujejo z materinsko vlogo. Seksualne delavke se tako v materinski kot v partnerski vlogi vrednotijo izrazito pozitivno, čeprav morajo zaradi ambivalentnosti teh življenjskih področij razviti strategije usklajevanja različnih socialnih vlog.This master’s thesis studies the notions of motherhood and intimate relationship among female sex workers in Slovenia. The identity of a sex worker as a mother and a partner does not fit the socially proposed feminine ideal, which poses new challenges in terms of finding balance between different social roles. In the theoretical introduction, sex work is introduced in a wider socio-political context, presenting various regulatory practices, as well as different views and positions towards sex work. Furthermore, the thesis focuses on explaining the social-constructionist background of various social and gender roles, emphasizing the role of a mother. A combined research approach along with the methodological triangulation was used in order to discover how sex workers define these roleshow they manage the coexistence of the roles of a mother, a partner, and a sex workerand what kind of coping strategies they develop in order to successfully balance the different areas of their lives. The sample comprised 22 sex workers and 4 professionals from different governmental and non-governmental social welfare organizations. The findings indicate that maintaining an intimate relationship while being involved in sex work is way more difficult than managing the coexistence of sex work and motherhood. Therefore, sex workers are more successful in coping with the ambivalence over the roles of a sex worker and a mother. Although their self-evaluation as mothers and partners is distinctively positive, they have to develop different coping strategies in order to manage different social roles