NONUSE OF CONDOMS BY PROSTITUTE WOMEN

Ethnographic research among Glasgow female prostitutes working in stre et, sauna, pat, escort agency and 'sugar daddy' sectors investigated p rostitutes' accounts of the occasions in which condoms were not used f or penetrative sexual encounters. Such occasions were a minority of co mmercial sex encounters and a majority of private sex encounters. Alth ough prostitutes saw condom use as inappropriate in private sexual rel ationships this was not, as has been suggested, an aid to relationship interpretation as either private or commercial. Condoms in commercial sex were seen as routine tools of the trade, and hence emerged as emb lems of prostitution. These emblematic qualities were found in turn to produce both challenges to condom use fr om customers and opportuniti es for prostitutes to manipulate customer relations by judicious suspe nsion of condom application. Both norms of gendered role-play and pros titute status were highlighted as threatening condom use in some situa tions, while prostitute status could also be used as the basis of rati onal argument for condom use in others. Relational issues such as fami liarity or a desire to communicate trust were at the forefront in expl anations of condom non-use. Perceptions of physical power and the auth ority to permit or withhold sexual service or Profit were determining influences crucial in condom use negotiation.