Lily Whitehead

My dissertation considers sex worker advertisement cards placed in London telephone boxes from 1984 to 2001 through a spatial analysis of the cards, the telephone box and the urban landscape. Narratives of abjection, dirt and disgust are explored in order to assess the extent to which the cards repositioned the space of the telephone box in the public imagination. It is a social history told through design and is primarily focused on how objects can be weaponised when marginalised communities take up space in an urban environment. The participants in the creation, distribution and policing of the cards are discussed as well as notions of public and private space, the design of telephone kiosks and the legislative difference between stickers and Blu-tack.

Image: Sex Worker Card c. 1985 (Bishopsgate Institute). A business card with the words ‘New! New! New!’ It also has an image of a woman on.