Paper short abstract:

This paper undertakes a narrative analysis to consider the politics of human suffering and misery in the anti-trafficking movement and construction of the victim subject/suffering female body.

Paper long abstract:

In 2009 The New York Times published an account of trafficking in Cambodia written by the Pulitzer-prize winning journalist, Nicholas Kristof, that featured the title: 'If this isn't slavery, what is?' In this paper, I undertake a narrative analysis of trafficking stories, exploring some of the very powerful rhetoric and use of melodrama in these narratives. I argue that the use of melodrama as a mode of story-telling serves as a form of emotional coercion forcing audiences into uncritically accepting the logic of trafficking, and which has allowed the anti-trafficking movement to avoid addressing the philosophical and definitional problems surrounding trafficking. I consider some of the narrative devices used as rhetorical strategies designed to establish female innocence and construct victimhood, including the almost exclusive focus on abduction and extreme tortures stories, and explore the extraordinary rhetorical and persuasive power of these narrative strategies. Ultimately, the paper explores the 'politics of pity' shaping the global anti-trafficking movement and argues that Cambodian women's raw, physical suffering is used as a means of creating solidarity in global audiences with the movements aims and conservative anti-sex work agenda.