This project involves the dissertation research of an anthropology student from Rutgers University, studying the national development policy of the Thai government as it affects the work choices made by rural village women. The student will examine the development policies and rhetoric of the Thai government, as well as the opportunities for women to make a living in two rural northern Thai provinces. The specific focus of the project will be to explain the role of unique cultural factors in Thailand's heritage as well as the social and political factors in the twentieth century which have facilitated the rapid growth of the sex industry (some estimates of as much as 10 percent involvement of women in the age group 14-24) with the concomitant growth of STDs in general and HIV/AIDS in particular. Using ethnographic methods the student will try to understand how families in the north, a source area for commercial sex workers, justify this work with reference to the traditional alternatives. The project will evaluate different theoretical rationales for this prevalence, from the cultural tradition of lower female status associated with Theravada Buddhism, to the change from matrilineal to patrilineal resource flows associated with western-style capitalist development, to the national development policies of the government which have decreased economic opportunities in the north with respect to the south. This research is important because it will advance our understanding of the causes of the extraordinary commercialization of female sexuality in the case of Thailand, which will help our general understanding of this process in other cultures.
