On “Companions of Joy”: The Gender/Ethnic Composition of Sex Workers in Modern Greece

Abstract

The article examines the phenomenon of prostitution in Greece of the 20th–21st centuries, the attitudes toward it, and its role in the regulation of social relations with reference to tradition. Noticeable and interesting to study are the changes that took place during this period in the gender/ethnic composition of representatives of the sphere of intimate services. The turning points for change were economic crises and upsurges in the country, migration processes, as well as new directions in international politics and ideology of the European Union, which Greece joined in 1981. In the 1990s–2000s, for example, workers of foreign origin prevailed in the sphere of intimate services. The crisis of 2008 led to the increase in the percentage of Greek citizens in this sphere, according to studies conducted by sociologists at the Pandion University of Athens. With regard to the gender aspect, it is especially interesting to study the attitudes toward male prostitution in a patriarchal society, which modern Greece still essentially is. Particular attention in the article is paid to linguistic material shedding light on contemporary nominations of representatives of the most ancient profession.