Gabriele Koch, "Healing Labor: Japanese Sex Work in the Gendered Economy," (Stanford University Press, 2020)

Contemporary Japan is home to one of the world's largest and most diversified markets for sex. Widely understood to be socially necessary, the sex industry operates and recruits openly, staffed by a diverse group of women who are attracted by its high pay and the promise of autonomy--but whose work remains stigmatized and unmentionable. Based on fieldwork with adult Japanese women in Tokyo's sex industry, Healing Labor explores the relationship between how sex workers think about what sex is and what it does and the political-economic roles and possibilities that they imagine for themselves. Gabriele Koch reveals how Japanese sex workers regard sex as a deeply feminized care--a healing labor--that is both necessary and significant for the well-being and productivity of men. In this nuanced ethnography that approaches sex as a social practice with political and economic effects, Koch compellingly illustrates the linkages between women's work, sex, and the gendered economy. Healing Labor by Gabriele Koch Japanese Sex Industry and Gendered Economy Ethnography of Sex Work in Tokyo Sex as Healing Labor in Contemporary Japan Social Necessity of Japan’s Sex Market Japanese Women in the Sex Industry Feminized Care Work and Sex in Japan Autonomy and Stigma in Japan’s Sex Trade Political-Economic Roles of Japanese Sex Workers Fieldwork on Japan’s Adult Entertainment Industry Gender, Sex Work, and Social Practice in Tokyo Women’s Work and the Gendered Economy in Japan High-Pay and Autonomy in Japan’s Sex Industry Sex as Care and Healing Labor in Japan Economic Impacts of the Japanese Sex Market East Asian Studies Podcast Japanese History Podcast Japanese Economic History