Globally, discussions about sex work focus on exploitation. The media regularly provides us with stories about teen girls coerced to perform sexual acts for money, frequently beaten and robbed by their pimps or traffickers. While one would have to be hard-pressed to deny that sex workers are victimized, the popular media and our political leaders emphasize sex work as exclusively exploitative. In Negotiating Sex Work, Carisa R. Showden and Samantha Majic present a series of essays that depict sex work as an issue far more complex than generally perceived.

Positions on sex...