The Joanna Project:a faith based project supporting street sex workers in Leeds

This case study focusses on the work of the Joanna Project (JP); a small, faith-based project, which supports street sex workers in Leeds. This study will explore some of the challenges arising when working with this service user group and some of the ways in which the values of community development contribute towards tackling the systemic disadvantage and disempowerment experienced by women who sell sex. The workers at JP have an explicit commitment to work with the marginalized and dispossessed, and it is their Christian beliefs that in turn feedback into the project and has helped to create a strong and consciously realised identity which forms the core of its philosophy and identity. These ideas have helped the project to identify that for a group of marginalised, stigmatised women simply valuing that person for themselves is an important act of humanity and helps, in that moment, to give back some dignity or love that life on the streets may have stripped away. The fundamental nature of the work is relational, with an emphasis on building positive relationships based on unconditional positive regard for another human being

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