body workers' atlas

data justice for migrant massage workers

We invite you to grapple with the policing of migrant Asian massage work throughout New York City and to listen to the voices and lives behind the data. This project offers a critical intervention to the mapping projects undertaken by carceral anti-trafficking organizations that manipulate big data to stroke fears around massage work. These visualizations flatten the lives of workers to one-dimensional points on a map and are used to bolster policies that criminalize racialized and gendered low wage work. We encourage you to engage with the stories (un)told here and share them to amplify the struggle and power of migrant massage worker organizing.