An "Enemy Against Society?": Sex Work and Victorian Ideals in Sandpoint, Idaho

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Paper / Report Submission (General Sessions)", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

In 2006, the state of Idaho began its largest archaeological project to date: the Sandpoint Archaeology Project. Emerging from 500 units, over 550,000 artifacts tell the story of the town’s “Restricted District,” home to two houses of sex work, two saloons, and a dance hall. The adjacent proximity of a brothel and a bordello allows researchers the opportunity to comparatively analyze the complex realities of sex work in the American West. Moreover, these locations are also relevant to a larger disciplinary conversation surrounding the roles gender and sexuality play in creating and challenging social norms. This paper presents preliminary archival and material culture-based research on Sandpoint’s “Restricted District” to interrogate how residents negotiated Victorian norms and ideals in conjunction to their participation in the sex work industry.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2024   •
• Paper / Report Submission (General Sessions)

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow