What’s Happening

Sex Work Activism in Canada: Speaking Out, Standing Up

By Jessica Rose/herizons, summer 2021

Sex Work Activism in Canada: Speaking Out, Standing Up is dedicated to “all of the sex workers, activists, and allies who have worked for so many decades to fight for sex worker rights in Canada.” Edited by sex work activists Amy Lebovitch and Shawna Ferris, it’s an impressive collection of knowledge, best practices, challenges, and successes, preserving stories often “pushed to the margins or neglected in official histories.”

Rooted in the recollections of sex work organizations coast to coast, Sex Work Activism in Canada is deliberate in its approach, resisting an academic peer review and chronicling organizations’ histories from west to east. At more than 400 pages, it’s a spectacular archive that will undoubtedly act as a resource for generations of activists and organizations to come. “It became increasingly clear to me over the years that preservation, the sharing of memories, stories, feelings, and histories, was so important to document,” writes Lebovitch in the book’s introduction.

“In the wake of precedents set in the Ontario and BC-based constitutional challenges brought by sex worker activists, now seemed a particularly important point to collect and share records of the decades of creative, collaborative, and revolutionary community-building, outreach and support, awareness raising, rabble-rousing, and legislative work that got us here,” writes Ferris of the book’s timeliness. Sex Work Activism in Canada also looks deeply at commonalities among many organizations coast to coast, with themes including generating and maintaining funding and stability, challenging stigma associated with sex work, and “the ebb and flow of public and political support for sex workers.” The book also includes a number of French-language contributions.

Populated by primary sources, including photographs, posters and zines, plus back-of-the-book resources about sex worker rights, Sex Work Activism in Canada will not only benefit sex work activists and organizations. It’s also an indelible resource that captures powerful histories that will help non-sex workers better understand sex worker activist concerns, aims and experiences. It is an essential read for feminists who want to ensure their feminism encompasses sex workers’ experiences and perspectives. Above all, it’s a book about resilience and the collective power of sex workers coming together to fight to take up space and fight injustice.

Reproduced with the permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission.