Jay Levy

PhD Candidate

Biography

Qualifications

2008-present PhD Candidate, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge
2007-2008 MPhil Geographical Research, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge
2003-2006 BA (Hons) Geography, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge

Research

My research focuses on issues of gender, sexuality, harm reduction, sexual health policy, contagious disease legislation, HIV/AIDS and blood-borne infection prevention and treatment policy, zero-tolerance and spatial displacement, and social engineering.

My work explicitly explores how Swedish legislation and discourses have impacted marginalised groups in Sweden. More specifically, I am interested in the 1999 Swedish law criminalising the purchase of sex, and how this sexköpslagen and its discursive backdrop have impacted the lives of people working in the Swedish sex industry. I also explore issues and ideas surrounding the the migration of people working in the sex industry. Sweden's striving to become a 'drug free society', and the impacts of this goal on drug users in Sweden, as well as the criminalisation of the use of drugs and introduction of compulsory rehabilitation for drug users, are additionally areas of concentration.

Ongoing fieldwork (2008-present) in Stockholm and Malmö includes face-to-face qualitative interviews and participant observation. Respondents include sex workers, drug users, politicians, NGO workers, activists, police, healthcare providers, and social workers. I am currently conducting research in Stockholm.

Publications

Conference and seminar papers

Impacts of the Swedish Criminalisation of the Purchase of Sex on Service Provision for Sex Workers, Correlation Conference, Ljubljana, 2011
Impacts of the Swedish Criminalisation of the Purchase of Sex on Sex Workers, British Society of Criminology Annual Conference, Northumbria University, 2011
Disunity in a Post-Apartheid Cape Town - Race and Gender Relations in Cape Town's Gay Village, DeWaterkant, Royal Geographical Society, London, 2008
Sex work as 'Violence Against Women' - The Swedish Model, Launch of the University of Cambridge Centre for Gender Studies, Cambridge, 2008

Teaching

Geographical Tripos Part IB, Supervisor, Cities
Geographical Tripos Part II, Supervisor, The Historical Geography of the AIDS Pandemic
Geographical Tripos Part II, Dissertation Supervisor