Sex Work in Southeast Asia

Leslie Barnes's book analyzes literary and cinematic scenes that portray sex work in Cambodia and Vietnam, highlighting ambivalence rather than straightforward moralizing.

Drawing on film, fiction, documentary, and graphic narrative, it explores how subjects—sex workers, procurers, and clients—are represented amid global and historical imperial forces.

The work interrogates rescue and trafficking narratives, celebrity activism, sex tourism, and marriage migration to show how aesthetics shape knowledge and policy about sex work.

Barnes emphasizes close readings and the capacity of creative texts to sustain contradictory perspectives that complicate simple victim/agent binaries.

The book argues for a suspension of judgment to better understand sex work's social, historical, and representational complexities.