Stigma in Nairobi: 20th Century

Women's hut in Nairobi, Kenya

Women used relations with employed men as a means to acquiring property.

Philip E. Harding, 1983, University of Washington Digital Collections

Prostitution in Colonial Nairobi:

Prostitution served a very specific purpose for women in British colonial Africa. Due to the lack of formal employment opportunities for women, females participated in sex work as a means to acquiring property–this allowed them to maintain control over their earnings through their relations with employed men. Prostitution was perceived as a "reliable means of capital accumulation, not as a despicable fate or a temporary strategy" [1].

Indoor and Outdoor Prostitution:

Beginning in the early 20th century, Luise White examines how prostitution evolves through the 1960s in the book The Comforts of Home: Prostitution in Colonial Nairobi. Specifically, she delves into the differences between indoor and outdoor prostitution, frequently alluding to the varying expectations associated with each. The outdoor form (watembezi) refers to streetwalking or public prostitution. This includes all women who solicit men in all the places the law considers public: bars, hotel lobbies, and streets. The watembezi form was considered to be “at the bottom of the social scale”, while the indoor form (malaya) was considered “better”[1].

Malaya protitutes were thought to be "just like married women"[1]. These women stayed inside their rooms and waited for men to come to them. Once the men were there, they paid not only for sexual favors but for other services that a spouse would typically provide (such as food preparation, bathwater, conversation, and breakfast). The malaya form was only possible for women who owned a room or hut of their own. Malaya prostitutes would condemn watembezi and wazi wazi prostitutes, labeling them as “cruel” and “aggressive” for publicly selling their bodies. Further, malaya prostitutes were perceived as less shameful because they "did not have to disgrace themselves by flagrant solicitation or accept customers who were diseased, violent, or overly demanding." White articulates that it is not the act of prostitution itself which is “shameful” or disrespectful” but rather, it is the visibility of it which is[1].

Mother and children outside hut in Nairobi.

Property, prostitution, and sex work are all tied to and dependent on one another. Thus, sex work is often conceptualized as family labor. The capital gained through work provides a safe space for families to live and support one another.

Rev. W B Stevenson, 1926, University of Southern California Digital Library

Prostitution and Kinship:

While in 19th century Paris prostitution prevented women from entering into family life, prostitution in Nairobi was often considered family labor. The earnings of prostitutes helped to reproduce families; sex workers themselves as heads of the household bought and kept property for their families of origin and for their children. Despite much of the stigma directed towards watembezi prositutes specifically, it appears that they were especially likely to be using their labor to help their kin:

"...The most aggressive prostitution, conducted from windows and stoops, was performed by the most dutiful of daughters. The women who walked the streets were also working for their families. It was the women who waited decorously and discretely in their rooms, peaceful and isolated, deferential and polite, who were in fact entirely out for themselves, eager to disinherit fathers and brothers..." (White, 1990, p.20)

[1]White, Luise. The Comforts of Home: Prostitution in Colonial Nairobi. Chicago: U of Chicago, 1990. Print.