Jennifer Greenwood

My thesis looks specifically at the lived experience of sex workers in eighteenth century London. 

Applying a sensory history narrative, the thesis seeks to uncover the lived experience of sex work within the eighteenth century, focusing on what they would have interacted with.

Breaking the research down into each individual sense, the thesis will explore what sex workers touched, saw, heard, smelt and tasted. This will explore a range of topics such as the criminal persecution of sex workers, the visual representations within print culture, evolving ideas around perfumes and scent, and the sale of aphrodisiacs on the eighteenth century London street, all with the aim of piecing together what it was actually like to be a sex worker in the eighteenth century metropolis.

My broader research interests include social and cultural histories of the eighteenth century, early modern medical history, sensory history, art history, gender history, print and popular culture, and the histories of sex and sexualities.