Description: Using of a broad range of materials, Gail Hershatter examines prostitution in Shanghai from the late nineteenth century to the present. Prostitutes have been near the bottom of Shanghai's class and gender hierarchies, yet they serve as central figures in urban life. For the 1950s Communist leadership, eliminating prostitution symbolized China's emergence as a strong and modern nation. In the 1990s, prostitution has been incorporated into larger discussions about sex and gender in modernity. Central to Hershatter's study is the investigation of how things are known and remembered, eventually being simultaneously apprehended and reinvented by historians.

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