Obtaining Drugs

This chapter, like the last one, deals with encounters between drugs and people. Here, the focus is on how the women acquire drugs in relation to drug markets. The clash between an illegal, masculine-coded street market associated with violence, and the ideal drug-induced state that is described in terms of intimacy and community, is explored. Where does the encounter between the women and the drugs they use take place? On what terms? What are the roles of gender and class? Some women buy their drugs themselves, but many receive most of their drugs as gifts. In the latter case, drugs move into a gift economy that involves different forms of expectation of reciprocation in various different, classed contexts.