3 CAMGIRL AND THE UBERIZATION OF SEX WORK ON THE INTERNET IN BRAZIL

• DOI: 10.22533/at.ed.4182115063

• Palavras-chave: Neoliberal Rationality; Sex Work; Uberization

• Keywords: Neoliberal Rationality; Sex Work; Uberization

• Abstract:

  The research topic concerns the provision of female erotic services via the internet in Brazil. Its subject is the practice of a Web Striper, WebCam Model, or Camgirl performed by women who offer to fulfil customer requests online from a simple chat to performing a strip tease, masturbating or simulating sex in front of a webcam. It should not be confused with prostitution, as there is no physical contact between the performer / customer, but classified as “tele-sex”. The activity involving a Camgirl is widespread on adult or “18+” websites on the Internet, with a variety of preferences related to age, nationality, gender, sexual orientation and preferences. In this article, we limit the scope of the research to models aged 18 to 35 years old in Brazil. The intent of the research on this topic is to insert it into the socio- anthropological and legal debate about sex work, and apply this to a discussion on new labor relations in the sex market – entrepreneurship, self-employment, disguised employment relationships and “uberization”. The questions that are relevant to the research include “What types of work, concepts and innovations are involved in the activity of a Camgirl?”; “What determines the success of a model in this sector?”; “What concepts link information technology to sex work on the Internet?”. [As this is a research in progress, a great deal of work has been done in the year since the approval of the initial abstract and there were some changes made to the abstract presented initially]. Up to the current stage of the research, we have worked under the hypothesis that the Camgirl profession is an occupation within the field of restructured pornography, with demands for self-employment and disguised employment relationships, and this activity links information technology and sex work through the concepts of neo- liberal rationality and uberization. The methodology is grounded in a variety of techniques, but mainly in semi-structured interviews and virtual ethnography.

• Número de páginas: 14