In Belo Horizonte, since the beginning of the 20th Century, the four-block area between the bus and train stations has been known as the city's major red-light district, called "Zona Grande". Today almost two-thousand women provide sex services to clients within some twenty hotels located in the area. We discuss the relationship between gender, identity, work, and territory among the women. The establishment of a professional identity as sex worker can contribute to their empowerment by facilitating a social and political organization that allows them to demand, among other issues, their permanence in this area, traditionally a target of hygienist urban policies that sought "to clean" the area by removing the hotels. We also contribute to a discussion of gender and identity in relation to territory.
Gender; Sex Work; Identity; Prostitution; Territory; Brazil