This course studies the history of prostitution and sex work, with a focus on the ways that sex workers have, throughout history, been at the center of societies’ fears regarding relationships between gender, sexuality, labor, and economic agency. Case studies will include prostitution in Victorian England and Gold Rush-era San Francisco, male prostitutes in New York City at the turn of the twentieth century, and sex work under colonialism in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere. The culture wars over sex work that ensued between sex positive feminists and anti-porn feminists during the 1980s will be explored, as well as contemporary debates about decriminalization, legalization, and trafficking. Finally, the course will examine current sex workers’ rights movements around the world.