40,000 Missing Girls: Sexual Panics, Prostitution, and Police Violence During the World Cup and the Olympics in Brazil

40,000 Missing Girls: Sexual Panics, Prostitution, and Police Violence During the World Cup and the Olympics in Brazil

Gregory Mitchell (Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies, Williams College)
Monday, April 11, 2016 / 4:00 PM
McCune Room, 6020 HSSB

In the run-up to the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympics, the Brazilian government engaged in a militarized campaign to clean up favelas, blighted areas, and red light districts so that it could “develop” them. This talk, based on ethnographic work in Rio de Janeiro, London, and Cape Town, argues that there is a pattern in host cities of such events in which neoliberal agents, state forces and NGOs use discourses of feminism and human rights – especially unfounded fears about sex trafficking and sports – to enact such changes regardless of the political economic conditions or systems of governance. Through these actions, these coalitions have created channels for the very exploitation they purport to prevent and increased sexual health vulnerabilities for at-risk populations. Mitchell is Assistant Professor at Williams College in Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies and affiliate faculty in the Department of Anthropology & Sociology.

Sponsored by the IHC’s New Sexualities RFG, the Dept. of Global Studies, the Hull Chair in Feminist Studies, the Dept. of Feminist Studies, the Dept. of Latin American and Iberian Studies, Dr. Paul Amar, Dr. Jennifer Tyburczy, and the IHC.