| This dissertation explores the transformation of reproductive practices in the Badi community in Nepal after their association with prostitution became a matter of public policy. By examining the social impact of AIDS prevention projects, it discusses how the global discourses and institutions promote standardization of what "sex work" is understood to be, and how this standardized meaning is interwoven with local notions of community, family, and reproduction. Through ethnographic fieldwork, this study situates the lives of Badi people within local histories, and documents how they reflect on their own lives and make claims in long-standing conflicts over health care, housing, schooling, and citizenship. This research argues that the transformation of reproductive practices has become central to the transformation of their marginality, and the aspiration for the formation of respectable families involves new practices of gender and kinship that affects the intimate relations in their daily lives. |
