{"product_id":"2026100008993-secondhand-prostitution","title":"Prostitution","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition remarks:\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBook: Good\u003cbr\u003eJacket: Wear and tear with damage\u003cbr\u003ePages: Yellowed\u003cbr\u003eMarkings: Previous owner\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOne of the most unflinching social documents of the Victorian era, William Acton's Prostitution presents a groundbreaking and methodical examination of the sex trade in nineteenth-century Britain, scrutinising the moral, medical, and political dimensions of a subject that polite society preferred to ignore. Acton, a surgeon and authority on venereal disease, chronicles the lives of women working in prostitution across London and other urban centres, arguing with remarkable compassion and rigour that the trade was a product of poverty and social inequality rather than innate moral failing — a radical proposition for its time. His detailed observations on the regulation of prostitution, public health policy, and the experiences of working-class women make this a landmark work in the history of Victorian social reform.\n\nEdited with an introduction and notes by Peter Fryer for the Fitzroy Editions series, this republication restores Acton's text to its rightful place as essential reading in the history of sexuality, gender, and urban society. Acton's prose is measured and clinical yet suffused with a reformist urgency that continues to resonate, offering modern readers an invaluable window into the harsh realities of Victorian street life and the nascent stirrings of public health consciousness. For scholars of social history, gender studies, and nineteenth-century Britain, this volume remains an indispensable and startlingly modern primary source.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49336814141659,"sku":"2026100008993-SECONDHAND","price":50.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/cafca36a-550c-437a-82dc-4188d02479d3.png?v=1789958586","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/2026100008993-secondhand-prostitution","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}