Complicates the process of scholarly inquiry into two-spirit lives, identities, and communities in service of creating a more just world by focusing on the needs, desires, and refusals of young Indigenous people. Addresses the distinct experiences of Indigenous trans, queer and two-spirit young people, which no published scholarly monograph has done to date. Expands the literature on two-spirit identities and communities using a methodology that centers the expertise of Indigenous youth.

Sex work is a subject of significant contestation across academic disciplines, as well as within legal, medical, moral, feminist, political and socio-cultural discourses. A large body of research exists, but much of this focuses on the sale of sex by women to men and ignores other performances, practices, meanings and embodiments in the contemporary sex industry. A queer agenda is important in order to challenge hetero-centric gender norms and to develop new insights into how gender, sex, power, crime, work, migration, space/place, health and intimacy are understood in the context of commercial sexual encounters. Queer Sex Work explores what it might mean to 'be', 'do' and 'think' queer(ly) in the study and practice of commercial sex. It brings together a multiplicity of empirical case studies - including erotic dance venues, online sex working, pornography, grey sexual economies, and BSDM - and offers a variety of perspectives from academic scholars, policy practitioners, activists and sex workers themselves. In so doing, the book advances a queer politics of sex work that aims to disrupt heteronormative logics whilst also making space for different voices in academic and political debates about commercial sex. This unique and multidisciplinary volume will be indispensable for scholars and students of the global sex trade and of gender, sexuality, feminism and queer theory more broadly, as well as policymakers, activists and practitioners interested in the politics and practice of sex work in local, national and international contexts.

Sex work is a subject of significant contestation across academic disciplines, as well as within legal, medical, moral, feminist, political and socio-cultural discourses. A large body of research exists, but much of this focuses on the sale of sex by women to men and ignores other performances, practices, meanings and embodiments in the contemporary sex industry. A queer agenda is important in order to challenge hetero-centric gender norms and to develop new insights into how gender, sex, power, crime, work, migration, space/place, health and intimacy are understood in the context of commercial sexual encounters. Queer Sex Work explores what it might mean to 'be', 'do' and 'think' queer(ly) in the study and practice of commercial sex. It brings together a multiplicity of empirical case studies - including erotic dance venues, online sex working, pornography, grey sexual economies, and BSDM - and offers a variety of perspectives from academic scholars, policy practitioners, activists and sex workers themselves. In so doing, the book advances a queer politics of sex work that aims to disrupt heteronormative logics whilst also making space for different voices in academic and political debates about commercial sex. This unique and multidisciplinary volume will be indispensable for scholars and students of the global sex trade and of gender, sexuality, feminism and queer theory more broadly, as well as policymakers, activists and practitioners interested in the politics and practice of sex work in local, national and international contexts.

Author Mary La Grande Nicholas's life hasn't always been easy, but she credits a guardian angel for helping her navigate to the place she is today. In Thru Hell on the Good Foot, she shares anecdotes and stories from her life's journey.Her story begins with her birth in 1946 in High Point, North Carolina, the second of two daughters. She tells of her father's death when she was two years old, her mother's remarriage, her mother's death when Mary was just eight years old, and Mary's subsequent move to New Jersey to live with relatives. She shares a host of traumatic stories, including a confrontation with the Ku Klux Klan, encounters with a pimp and drug dealers, and a beating from police.Thru Hell on the Good Foot demonstrates her courage and perseverance as she followed the path to adulthood without parents or a proper role model, eventually becoming a nurse and caring for patients with Alzheimer's disease. Her story communicates there is help and hope.