Work in Progress
For my dissertation project, I am currently working on women who sold sex, their network, and mobility in order to examine the development of welfare systems in modern Japan. This project focuses on prostitutes from 1925 to 1965 around Tokyo. It investigates what kind of health and working problems prostitutes faced around World War II, how they attempted to address these problems with their mobility and personal connections, and how they collectively build community welfare in the postwar era. It contends that investigating the history of prostitutes’ homosocial connections will show how prostitutes initiated their health, financial, self-protection programs that shape Japanese governmental welfare today.