Drawing on interviews with sex workers as well as their political and creative writings, Berg’s book approaches sex workers as theorists of work, family, the state, respectability, care, and everyday resistance. Centering the perspective of the lumpenproletariat, Notes from the Sex Worker Left asks what becomes visible when those most criminalized and excluded from respectable political life are understood as thinkers at the edge of radical political theory.

The event will feature comments by Kathi Weeks and Tania Rispoli, followed by a response from Heather Berg and open discussion.

Heather Berg is Associate Professor of Labor Studies and Gender Studies at UCLA and the author of Porn Work: Sex, Labor, and Late Capitalism. Notes from the Sex Worker Left: Lumpen Theory is forthcoming from Duke University Press in October 2026.