Germany has been infamously dubbed the "Brothel of Europe," but how does legalized prostitution actually work? Is it empowering or victimizing, realistic or dangerous? In Legalized Prostitution in Germany, Annegret D. Staiger's ethnography engages historical, cultural, and legal contexts to reframe the brothel as a place of longing and belonging, of affective entanglements between unlikely partners, and of new beginnings across borders, while also acknowledging the increasingly exploitative labor practices. By sharing the stories of sex workers, clients, and managers within the larger legal system-meant to provide dignity and safety through regulation-Staiger skillfully frames the economic aspects of commercial sex work and addresses important questions about sexual labor, intimacy, and relationships. Weaving insightful scholarship with beautiful storytelling, Legalized Prostitution in Germany provides readers with a deeper understanding of the complexities of legalized prostitution.

Every porn scene is a record of people at work. But on-camera labor is only the beginning of the story. Part labor history, part ethnography illuminating the lives of the performers who work in the medium, Porn Work takes readers behind the scenes to explore what porn performers think of their work and how they intervene to hack it. It tells a story of crafty workers, faltering managers, and shifting solidarities. Blending extensive fieldwork with feminist and antiwork theorizing, Porn Work details entrepreneurial labor on the boundaries between pleasure and tedium. Rejecting any notion that sex work is an aberration from straight work, it reveals porn workers' creative strategies as prophetic of a working landscape in crisis. In the end, it looks to what porn has to tell us about what's wrong with work, and what it might look like to build something better.