About the Research Team

The research for this project is lead by Melissa Ditmore, with co-researcher Kevicha Echols. Technical assistance, promotional support, and advisory support is provided by Audacia Ray. For information or inquiries about this project, email research [at] sexworkawareness.org.

All three are board members of Sex Work Awareness, a New York-based organization that works to inform sex workers and allies about what they can do to decrease stigma and violence for sex workers through communications and media strategy. For general inquiries about our work, email info [at] sexworkawareness.org

Full bios of the researchers below.

Melissa Ditmore was the inaugural Chair of the Advisory Board of the Sex Workers Project and is currently on the board of the Global Network of Sex Work Projects in addition to her work with SWA. Dr. Ditmore is the editor of the Encyclopedia of Prostitution and Sex Work (Greenwood Press, 2006). Melissa Ditmore has written about sex work, migration and trafficking for The Lancet and SIECUS Report. Ditmore is a contributor to Trafficking and Prostitution Reconsidered (Paradigm, 2005), Affective Turn (Duke, 2007) and Women Across Borders (Black Rose, forthcoming.) She edits the annual journal Research for Sex Work. She has spoken about prostitution, migration rights and research ethics at the United Nations, the International Conference on HIV/AIDS, Columbia University, Cornell University, Hong Kong City University and numerous academic and political conferences.

Kevicha Echols is a Vice President of SWA who is also a sex educator and a Doctor of Education candidate in the Human Sexuality program at Widener University.

Audacia Ray is a media maker and activist who is passionate about sexual rights. She is the author of Naked on the Internet: Hookups, Downloads, and Cashing In On Internet Sexploration (Seal Press, 2007) and is the award-winning director and producer of the porn feature The Bi Apple as well as the producer and star of the comedic film short Dacia’s Love Machine. Audacia is a former sex worker who was an executive editor at $pread magazine for three years and is a co-founder of advocacy organization Sex Work Awareness, where she edits the public education blog Sex Work 101 and develops and leads media trainings for sex workers. Dacia is the Program Officer for Online Communications and Campaigns at the International Women’s Health Coalition and an adjunct professor of Human Sexuality at Rutgers University. Dacia has been writing her personal blog, Waking Vixen, since 2004.