Sex Workers’ Writing Workshop
Saturday, 2/8, 2-4pm
(usually 2nd Saturday of every month, 2-4pm)
Sliding scale $10-$20 (more if you can, less if you can’t, **nobody turned away** — if you’re broke you should still come write with us!)
Workshop facilitated by Gina de Vries
This is a writing workshop for current and former sex workers to share their writing and get honest, non-judgmental feedback. Workshop participants are not obligated to write exclusively about sex work, but writing about work in the sex industry (as well as writing about other topics) will be welcomed. This is a place where people can write and share about their sex work experiences without having to censor themselves or explain every detail. Beginning writers are encouraged to attend along with more seasoned wordsmiths.
Sex Workers’ Writing Workshop is all-genders. We define the term “sex worker” broadly, as people who have exchanged erotic labor for money/food/shelter, including but not limited to:
+Street and Survival Sex Workers
+Escorts and Personal Companions
+Sensual Massage and Sensual Body Work Providers
+BDSM workers; pro-dommes, subs, and switches
+Adult Film Actors; Porn Models and Performers; Nude Models; Cam Girls and Boys
+Exotic Dancers; Strippers; and Peep Show Workers
+Phone Sex Operators
+And many other Sex Workers and Adult Entertainers!
(If we’re forgetting your area of the industry in this definition, tell us!)
**Email questions, volunteer inquiries, etc, to queershoulder@gmail.com.
**While we can’t guarantee a scent-free space, we ask that all attendees please refrain from wearing scented products to ensure that workshop members with chemical sensitivities can attend.
**We ask that our non-sex worker friends, lovers, partners, allies, and clients respect that this space is FOR SEX WORKERS ONLY.
INSTRUCTOR BIO: Gina de Vries is a genderqueer femme, a queer Paisan pervert, and a writer, performer, and activist with a long history doing political organizing in and with queer, trans and gender-variant, intersex, and sex worker communities. She co-edited the queer youth anthology [Becoming] with Diane Anderson-Minshall in 2004, and her publications include The San Francisco Bay Guardian, $pread, Curve, Coming & Crying, Take Me There: Trans & Genderqueer Erotica, and The Revolution Starts at Home. Gina is the founder and co-curator (with Elena Rose and Julia Serano) of “Girl Talk: a trans & cis woman dialogue,” a spoken-word show fostering and promoting dialogue about relationships of all kinds between non-trans and trans women. She has performed, taught, and lectured everywhere from chapels to leatherbar backrooms, and university appearances include Harvard University and Yale University. She is the founder and facilitator of Sex Workers’ Writing Workshop, a writing class for current & former sex workers at San Francisco’s Center for Sex & Culture (where she also serves on the Advisory Board). A graduate of Hampshire College, Gina is currently pursuing her Master of Fine Arts in Fiction Writing at San Francisco State University, where she is working on a book of short stories. Find out more at ginadevries.com, and keep track of her on the daily at queershoulder.tumblr.com