Summary Of Journey To Work: Transnational Prostitution

Journey to Work: Transnational Prostitution in Colonial British West Africa is an ambitious undertaking achieved by Saheed Aderinto. In this article, his main argument is that local social processes contributed to change the perceptions on the prostitution in Nigeria, and that prostitution network in Nigeria-Gold Coast flourished partly because men benefited of the remittance of women. But he also announces that his article adresses multiple other questions: « How did the attitudes of colonialists and Africans toward transnational prostitution change, and what factors account for the changes? How did the politics of stemming the tide of international prostitution dovetail with broader imperial practices of maintaining the colonies as sites of ruthless exploitation? (…) »
He poses a series of six questions he wants to address in his article, which broadens widely the scope of its analysis. But through its argument, Aderinto is implicitly saying the blame is not to put on British regarding …show more content…
He probably did a great work of research to gather all these informations. Saved Aderinto’s article also shows properly how the prostitution contributed to the social revolution which occurred in Nigeria, as well as the opinion of the society on prostitution during the twentieth century in Nigeria, from the colonialists side but also from the Nigerian indigenous side. Another phenomenon the author highlights well is the social processes contributing to the development of prostitution: the rising of colonial cities and mines, the « single ladies tickets » to events, how women who had left their village to prostitute influenced younger girls to do the same,… He also describes effectively the set of rules implemented (or not) by the British during the time they ruled Nigeria, and the effects it