Jineteras

I sat down this morning to work on my outline and then met with the chair of my committee about my project (she just happens to be visiting this week) for an hour. Afterwards I said to myself, jeez, I’m such an ambitious little kid. I have about two more interviews to go and then I think I’ll be done with my fieldwork. Now I’m working on transcribing my interviews, updating my outline, and picking and choosing what I’m going to use for dialogue. These are all the things I have to do before we present our projects at UNEAC (Union of Artists and Writers of Cuba) on April 25^{th (}I got the other date wrong). But this isn’t why I think this project is overly ambitious. Over the summer, I have to work on translating the script into English and then edit the projections and sound pieces that are going to accompany the play. And then in the fall, I have to assemble a whole cast and crew to put this play up, including a choreographer (I just decided this past week that I want to include movement in the piece) and bilingual actors. Oofa! I have my work cut out for me for the next 9 months.

My comfortable little outline that I’d assembled is kind of being put to the test by the interviews I’ve conducted with jineter@s. I’m trying to figure out ways to include their experiences alongside those of tobacco sellers and informal tour guides so that all stories are presented justly. While juxtaposing different ways people make a living in the informal tourist economy I want to avoid victimizing sex workers while at the same time not diminish the gravity of what it means to sell one’s body, rather than (just) an image or a product, to foreigners in order to survive. You know what I mean? If any Spanish speakers want to take a look at my outline and give me feedback on whether I’m presenting my participants fairly (or give me feedback overall) I’d be happy to send it along.

I’m particularly hung up on how to present (and process) this one interview I conducted with a young sex worker on Monday. She’s the first jinetera (female sex worker) I’ve spoken to—all the rest have been men—and it was very jarring to hear how she conceptualizes her work and her self-image. She does not like what she does, and until she sees herself out of that life, thinks of herself as “one of many nobodies, a nothing that won’t amount to anything.” It was painful enough hearing these words coming from any kind of capable, worthwhile human being, but her words reminded me how friends of mine have talked about themselves while they’ve been in abusive relationships, so it was doubly sad to listen to. Also, all of the lady sex workers I’ve talked to in the States before in detail about their work have been very unashamed and comfortable with what they do. So I guess my experiences with sex workers have been the complete opposite of the dominant image of the victimized young lady of the night who’s fallen into amorality out of desperation. But the thing is, plenty of women who do sex work do fall into that category—poor and desperate and completely unhappy about their situation. So I’m trying to reconcile this woman’s story with the many ways I’ve had stories like hers presented to me. On the one hand, she hates what she does and it makes her feel bad about herself, but on the other, she’s happy that she’s able to support her mom and her baby sister with less work than it would take if she was working at a paladar like her friends. This is in contrast to the jineteros (male sex workers) I’ve talked to, who are proud and happy with their work, even if they have to sleep with women they’re not attracted to, and they’re able to support their families. The difference here is real gendered- like my friend Anabel says, “It’s different being penetrated than being the one who does the penetrating.” We, lefties and radicals, have this issue of idealizing the subaltern and making la lucha out to be a lot cooler and counterhegemonic than it necessarily is. But the thing is, I feel like these experiences both totally play into existing patriarchal models; men can boast about their prowess while women have to feel ashamed about their promiscuity, even if they’re both engaging in the exact same work. It’s great that in the limited-resource situation most Cubans find themselves in, these folks have found ways to support themselves and their loved ones. But it’s not always cute. I’m certainly not thinking about it from a liberal humanist perspective as something pitiable or wretched, but I certainly can’t romanticize la lucha as being made up of nobly counterhegemonic acts.

Ugh.

I feel like I want to write more about the racial politics of jineterismo since it is overwhelmingly done by Afro-Cubans who cater to white tourists, but perhaps that’s its own blog post. I think I have to think that one through a little longer.