CHAPTER 9 CONCLUSION
“The purpose of anthropology is to make the world safe for human differences” (Ruth Benedict)
The main purpose of this study is to gain a deeper understanding about prostitution in Nicaragua by exploring a variety of different age groups of women that are involved to a certain extent in the sale of sex. My aim of doing so is to extract insights about the process that leads girls and women in and out of street life, which can be called “the cycle of prostitution”; and use this to discuss gender norms in Nicaragua as well as feminist perceptions on this issue.
The data collected for this thesis was obtained during three months of fieldwork in Managua; from which I have explored the different life stories of my informants. My findings regarding this data may be divided in two groups: those concerning the gender norms that can be explored through the life stories of my informants and those concerning the feminist’s debates that can be raised in light of my material. Hence, in this conclusive part of the thesis both types of findings will be summarized.
GENERAL REMARKS AND GENDER NORMS
The focus I have used in this master thesis by relying on informants from different age groups has tried to contribute with a greater understanding of prostitution, as research in this field tends not to include girls at risk nor ex-prostitutes as informants. What this thesis has tried to achieve is to get a wider picture of the reality of prostitution, which I intend to summarize in this conclusive findings.
Firstly, throughout the life interviews we have witnessed a story of negligent families, violent childhood, rape and lack of education. During their childhood, all my informants have experienced their bodies being treated as objects; either by rape, inspections or by being sold to men. Hence, these life stories seem to reveal a way of considering girls as already sexual and not perceiving them in the process of becoming so. It also appeared that all my informants have leant to tolerate violence against their bodies from a young age, a process that, for many, unfortunately continued over time.
Secondly, my informants’ views on prostitution varies, from perceiving it as an insulting job –Venancia–, a means to be loved and financially independent –Dulce–, a means to provide for their children –Gioconda and Rosa Argentina– or a means to fill their emptiness and forget their problems –Zenobia and Aura–. This shows that money is not the only perceived motive to engage in prostitution, whereas filling ‘emptiness’
has been shown as an important feature in starting it. This must be related to their possibly low self-esteem and to their family situation of negligence and abuse.
Concerning this, I have illustrated how Dulce or Zenobia exemplify how families can use –or try to use in Dulce’s case– their girl’s bodies to provide economically, by selling them to adult men when they are young. As for my informants, and in relation to remaining in prostitution, money as well as children has developed to be fundamental motives for them to stay, as prostitution is a way to provide for their children. However, as I mentioned in chapter 8, children can also be –as in Aura’s life story– a reason to quit too. In relation to quitting prostitution I have argued that it seems that women-who-have-prostituted needed either a partner or a job that helps them economically, a fact that will be analysed in the next section in relation to the feminist stances.
Thirdly, my focus on different age groups has highlighted how significantly the ideals of motherhood influence the lives of my informants during all their own lives; whether it is by their mothers’ negligence –when their mothers sell them to adults or when they are physically abused or uncared for– or whether it is by being teenage mothers themselves, by fighting for their children when they are on the streets or by focusing on motherhood when they quit prostitution. Interestingly, what is evident in their life stories is an idealization of motherhood despite their negative experiences of abusive and neglectful mothers. This can be acknowledged in the fact that they seem to seek to become mothers themselves, even if they suffered from abused and negligent ones; and also in the fact that many of my informants directly idealized their mothers. Like I already mentioned several times in the empirical chapters, I have understood this as a reflection of Nicaraguan gender norms and as illustrated by the ways in which the women invest in different subjects positions related to motherhood and home. This investment in motherhood and in their homes –i.e. their private sphere– can be understood as a way to gain credit as women.
Fourthly, a special place has been given to the stigma of prostitution, due to its relevance in these women’s and girls’ lives. In relation to the teenagers, I have illustrated how they are stigmatized due to their family situation and due to their sexual abuse. In relation to my adult informants, I have shown how they were previously stigmatized when young –in similar ways as the girls at risk were– and how the
‘prostitute stigma’ seems to be not only attached to the whole person (see chapter 7), but also attached to their whole personal history even when they quit prostitution (see chapter 8).
In these pages I have also explored the way in which these women developed strategies to fight against the ‘the whore stigma’, particularly regarding my adult informants.
These strategies vary from focusing on their re-productive roles, motherhood and on their more private subject positions in the attempt to distance themselves from their
‘prostitute identity’, to marrying somebody they do not love, not using condoms or choosing different forms of linguistic expressions that distance themselves from the negative connotation of prostitution.
In addition to this, what has been explored in the last two chapters is that prostitution for my informants has entailed not only negative experiences like stigma, rape and violence, but also positive ones like friendship, partners and money.
Fifthly, men are perceived by all my informants as producers but not providers, and their desires seem to be understood as uncontrollable. The figure of the ‘absent father’
has been shown in each of their life stories. My informant’s opinions towards men however vary greatly. Venancia and Dulce for example, from the girls at risk group share the most negative sentiments compared with the women-who-prostitute – Gioconda and Zenobia– who are the only two that state that the best thing that has happened to them in their lives relates to men.
Sixthly and lastly, as for the debate regarding Latin America and Nicaraguan women being portrayed as suffering or not in order to attain moral superiority; I have not perceived a discourse of victimization among my informants, although their life stories do show lives characterised by suffering. Furthermore, my informants would generally not employ the term “suffering” –although it was once used by Rosa Argentina–. Even
though their life stories are very dramatic and despite having suffered very much, my informants show a discourse of courage. The courage of these women, their efforts to survive and their enormous capacity of fighting against failure makes them, in my opinion, not deserving to be called “suffering women”. As far as this thesis concerns, suffering is not especially highlighted as part of their identification as women. In relation to Turid Hagene’s work (2006) whose findings are, at this respect, similar to those I am presenting here, she mentioned the ethnicity of her informants –mestizo– as influencing the fact that they were not using a discourse of suffering. In my findings, however, I can not rely on this as none of my informants spoke about ethnicity –neither in relation to themselves, nor in relation to anybody–.
To conclude, it has to be noted here that I have shown very different women and girls with different perspectives and understandings of life. Given these varieties it is very difficult to include them in an exclusive polarity such as suffering vs. not suffering women, which is a difficulty that I also found in categorizing women-who-prostitute only as exploited vs. liberated women, as I will show in the next section. As far as my informants concern, those theoretical polarities cannot accurately be applied for all people involved in prostitution, as they are exclusive and closed categories. Therefore, more research is needed in order to gain a better understanding of this, and hopefully to be able to solve these questions that remain unclear.