From Italy to Thailand to the United States, Shelley Cavalieri has traveled the world working on issues of human trafficking.

During her time in Italy, she provided social services to Nigerian women who had been trafficked into sex work, and she later won a research grant to study trafficking in Thailand.

Cavalieri is currently a visiting assistant professor of law at WVU, and will draw on these previous personal experiences presenting “Trafficked Women as Victims or Agents?” on Thursday, March 18 from 4 to 5 p.m. at the Greenbrier Room of the Mountainlair.

Her lecture is part of the Center for Women’s Studies 30th anniversary celebration, and will discuss the two main competing feminist theories of women in the sex trade.

One theory views sex work as inherently exploitative, while the other theory advocates for sex-worker rights.

Drawing on aspects of the both of these, Cavalieri has developed a third-way theory that stands on its own and attempts to reconcile key tenets of the other perspectives.

She offers a theory that realistically recognizes the pressure on women from the global south to enter the sex trade, but also proposes to increase women’s autonomy and capability to make other life choices.

Cavalieri’s third-way theory offers a series of interventions aimed at tearing down social barriers that third-world women encounter in trying to support themselves and their families.

The event is free and open to the public. For more information, contact Shelley Cavalieri at 304-293-4694 or Shelley.Cavalieri@mail.wvu.edu.

For a complete listing of the Center for Women’s Studies 30th anniversary events, visit http://wmst.wvu.edu.

-WVU-

aw/03/08/10

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