Tag: gender violence

Presenting at academic conferences: embracing discomfort

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Natasha Mulvihill, Andrea Matolcsi, and Catherine Briddick reflect on their experiences of academic conference presentations in the field of prostitutiongvr-slider

The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable […]. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers. (M. Scott Peck)

The academic conference is an established forum for colleagues to present early findings and to road-test theories.  Ranging from mutually affirming spaces, thronged with like-minded and well-acquainted delegates to more diverse, loosely-knit events where participants strike up haphazard groups, conferences offer different opportunities for communication and intellectual challenge.  But how far should we actively seek out academic conferences that engender some discomfort to, in Peck’s terms, nudge us out of our particular research perspectives?

In April, we attended the first international conference organised by PROSPOL (Comparing European Prostitution Policies:  Understanding Scales and Cultures of Governance), a funded strand of work under the European COST Action IS1209 initiative.  Held in Vienna, delegates were asked to submit papers under the conference banner ‘Troubling prostitution: Exploring intersections of sex, intimacy and labour’.  As researchers on prostitution policy for a number of years, we submitted and each had an individual paper accepted, as well as panel proposal, co-presented with a colleague at Oxford.

The delegate list boasted many of the contemporary researchers across the world writing on prostitution and prostitution policy: and was for this reason a landmark event.  For those unfamiliar with this field of work, there is common demarcation made between researchers who understand selling sex as labour which deserves a statutory footing, with attendant rights and work to reduce harm, and researchers who understand prostitution as a reflection of patriarchy, characterised often by exploitation and abuse, and who lobby for measures to reduce demand for paid sex and support for women to exit.  While this division glosses over the significant diversity of views within and across these positions, it is palpable in its effects.  Researchers adopt terms consistent with the polar perspective (“sex work”, “prostitution”) and first encounters with other researchers can involve a few moments of careful neutrality, like poker players trying to read the other’s hand.  Differences in standpoint have at times been personal and appear increasingly to be played out beyond the academic journals and in to social media.  Institutions on name badges and delegate lists can suggest allegiances: ‘Centre for Gender and Violence Research at the University of Bristol’, for example, positions us as likely ‘prohibitionists’.  Broadly, the PROSPOL conference was sympathetic to the sex work perspective.

We offer three observations.  First, the discussion on prostitution and sex work can echo the story of the blind men and the elephant: researchers are often talking about different aspects of the sex industry and projecting their findings across the piece.  For example, the experience of migrants working in parlours, female street workers, single mothers working independently from home, internet workers ‘on tour’, male escorts or female sex tourists are all characterised by different individual circumstances and different relations of power.  So all researchers need to be careful about how they evidence their claims.

Second, as researchers writing from a feminist perspective, we are nevertheless interested in the interconnections between experiences of women and men across the sex industry and how these relate to gender-power relations.  We are mindful that despite some diversity in those selling sex, and despite the intersectional relations of race, economic status, migration status (or lack thereof), sexuality or disability within the prostitution encounter, the purchase of sex remains an overwhelmingly masculine practice.  This deserves further analysis.

Third, we note that prostitution as a practice rooted in patriarchy has been re-envisioned through the sex work movement and imbued with new meanings of freedom, choice, rights and transgression.  Much of the current research is exploring the tensions between this understanding of prostitution and a less sympathetic legal and political context.   However, rather than a brave new world, our concern would be that that this perspective reinforces prevailing power relations.  For example, there was discussion within one panel that gender equality within sex work would mean more equal numbers of men and women paying for sex.  Yet, this is surely the old gender politics where role equity for women has required women to move in to male constructed domains (politics, the workplace, front-line combat etc.) but rarely requires role change for men, or a significant challenge to the rationale, operation or normative status of those domains.

Despite our different viewpoints, we learnt a great deal from the breadth of research presented.  We got to meet the people behind the printed word and exchanged stories of how we found ourselves researching this difficult area.  We had common experiences on methods, on ethics, and on working with other organisations such as the police and health services and indeed with the women and men selling sex.  There was universal agreement that these individuals should not be criminalised.

So while our experience at the conference was at times taxing, we came away from Vienna with new knowledge, new friendships and the recognition that a little discomfort can be a good thing.

Authors                                                                              

Dr Natasha Mulvihill is a Research Associate and teacher at the University of Bristol’s Centre for Gender and Violence Research.

Andrea Matolcsi is a third-year PhD student at the University of Bristol’s Centre for Gender and Violence Research. Her participation in this conference was fully supported by the University of Bristol Alumni Foundation.

Catherine Briddick is studying for a DPhil in Law at the University of Oxford where she teaches international law and the protection of refugees, migrants and displaced persons.

Men experiencing or perpetrating domestic violence linked with two to three-fold increase in mental health problems

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Marianne Hester, from the Centre for Gender Violence Research in the School for Policy Studies is leading research on domestic violence involving men as perpetrators or victimsMH

Men visiting their GP with symptoms of anxiety or depression are more likely to have experienced or carried out some form of behaviour linked to domestic violence and abuse, according to a new University of Bristol study. Researchers say the findings highlight the need for GPs to ask male patients with mental health problems about domestic abuse.

The study, led by Professor Marianne Hester OBE, and involving Dr Emma Williamson from the School, and published in BMJ Open, aimed to find out whether there is an association between men who have experienced or carried out domestic violence and abuse with men visiting their GP with mental health problems or who are binge drinking and using cannabis.

Researchers distributed a questionnaire across 16 GP practices in the South West that was completed by 1,368 men aged 18 years and above. The survey asked the men whether they had experienced or perpetrated any of four negative behaviours linked to domestic violence and abuse, such as feeling frightened, physically hurt, forced sex, or having to ask permission from a partner.

The survey then asked about experiences of these negative behaviours, followed by questions about their relationship with the perpetrator, frequency and escalation of the experience. Subsequent questions were then asked about the perpetration of any of the four negative behaviours towards a current or former partner in the past 12 months.

The study found 309 men, [22.7 per cent or nearly a quarter] of the 1,368 participants  experienced at least one of the four negative behaviours associated with domestic violence and abuse, and 212 [16.9 per cent or one-sixth] of 1,294 respondents reported perpetration of these behaviours at least once.

Researchers also found that men who used some form of negative behaviour towards their partners were three-to-five times more likely to report symptoms of anxiety than non-perpetrators. However, the study found no strong association between domestic violence and abuse with excessive drinking or cannabis use.

These findings indicate there is a higher likelihood of men who present symptoms of anxiety and depression in primary care could be the victims or perpetrators of domestic violence and abuse.

Professor Marianne Hester OBE, lead author of the study “Research on domestic violence and abuse has largely focused on women and there is a lack of research on men, both as victims and perpetrators.  The findings from this study are important as they suggest that when men present to GPs with anxiety or depression, they should be asked about domestic violence and abuse as there is a higher likelihood that they will be victims or perpetrators. The findings are consistent with previous studies, which found that mental health problems are more common in men who either perpetrate or experience domestic violence and abuse, and serve as an important indicator to clinicians.”

Professor Gene Feder, co-author on the study from the Centre for Academic Primary Care  at the School for Social and Community Medicine said: “The extent and health impact of negative behaviours consistent with domestic violence and abuse among male patients is largely invisible to GPs.  Our study will help focus attention on this hidden problem in general practice and provides a basis for training GPs in how to identify and respond safely to men experiencing or perpetrating domestic violence and abuse.”

Paper

Occurrence and impact of negative behaviour, including domestic violence and abuse, in men attending UK primary care health clinics: a cross-sectional survey by M Hester, G Ferrari, S K Jones, E Williamson, L J Bacchus, T J Peters and G Feder in BMJ Open.

Further information:

National DVA help service for men:

http://respect.uk.net

Sexual violence in India: feminists and others

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Geetanjali Gangoli, from the School for Policy Studies, discusses the issues raised by ‘India’s daughter’

The recent furore around the BBC Four documentary, India’s Daughter, has once again brought to the forefront the issue of sexual violence in India. Sexual violence continues to be a serious issue for Indian women. The latest crime statistics released by the Home Ministry’s National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB, 2014) show that 93 women are raped every day in the country. The number of reported rapes a day has increased nearly by 700% per cent since 1971 — when such cases were first recorded by the NCRB.

GG

The documentary, made for BBC by a British filmmaker Lesley Udwin was based on the well publicised rape and murder of 23 year old student, Jyoti Singh in a bus in New Delhi, and featured controversial interviews with Mukesh Singh, one of the six men accused in the case. He is currently on death row, awaiting an appeal to the Supreme Court, and he made several misogynist statements about the victim, including arguing that women were more responsible for rape than men were. He also argued that the woman should not have fought back, and that if he was executed, that it may lead to murders of rape victims. The film also included interviews with the defence lawyers, who also argued that the victim should not have been out at night with a male friend, and with her quietly dignified parents, and friend, whose voices are used effectively to challenge these pervasive rape myths.

As is well known by now, a group of feminists wrote an open letter to NDTV, an Indian news channel, which was planning to air the documentary on March 8th 2015 (at the same time as BBC Four), asking them to show restraint and postpone the broadcast, as the appeal against the death sentences is still pending; but also raising some other objections to the film, including that it promoted ‘hate speech’ against women, that it could lead to increased violence against women, and that it included graphic and gratuitous descriptions of sexual violence. The Indian government however banned the film, on the grounds that it violated ‘permission guidelines’ in airing the interviews with Mukesh Singh, and his comments were ‘highly derogatory’ and violated the dignity of women.

The documentary was, however, aired on BBC Four and released on you tube, rendering the ban ineffective. Since the ban, a number of interesting feminist views on this issue have been voiced, not one of them supporting the ban. What to me has been most impressive is that Indian feminists have been one of the strongest voices standing for the rights of the accused to a free trial (even and especially in a case where the ‘facts’ of the case appear to be clear), and arguing that the death penalty is not only counterproductive, but against feminist principles.

The film itself is interesting and well made, though at points tends to suggest that not much happened in the public and social sphere against sexual violence in India before this particular case, and that sexual violence owes much to poverty, deprivation and social exclusion made worse by globalization, and commodification of women. It projects Jyoti Singh’s rape and murder as emerging from a clash of culture between the upwardly mobile, forward thinking section of Indian society and the socially excluded working class, who have not been able to benefit from globalization. By virtue of omission, it also tends to project sexual violence as happening primarily in the public sphere, by strangers, rather than within the domestic sphere. Recent statistics released by the Delhi police suggest that in over 95% of all recorded cases of sexual violence, the accused was either a family member or known to the victim.

Indian feminists have of course, challenged these rape myths since the 1970s. They have constructed sexual violence as an act of patriarchal power and control, rather than as class warfare, and pointed to the endemic nature of rape and assault across social class, caste and region. Even though most cases of sexual violence around which Indian feminist campaigns have been centred on the rapes of working class and/or Dalit women by those in power (for e.g. the Mathura rape case in the late 1970s, and Bhanwari Devi case in the 1990s), feminists have placed sexual violence as an integral part of the domestic sphere, and demands have been made to the State to criminalise marital rape since the early 1980s. That these have still not been met reflects the pervasive nature of popular beliefs of the sanctity of marriage as a ‘private’ sphere, and the acceptance of male entitlement to women’s bodies, particularly in the home and within the private sphere.

Feminists have always (often simultaneously) collaborated with and opposed State (and media) engagement with gender based violence. Following Jyoti Singh’s rape and murder, feminist groups have fed into Justice Verma Committee , a committee made up of Justice J.S. Verma, Justice Leila Seth (both retired judges) and Gopal Subramanium constituted by the Government to look into possible amendments to the Criminal Justice Law ‘to provide for quicker trial and enhanced punishment for criminals committing sexual assault of extreme nature against women’, and some recommendations of the committee were passed into law through ordinance in early 2013. In opposition to feminist demands, the ordinance retained the marital rape exemption; therefore women in violent and abusive marriages continue to be unable to access the law when raped by intimates. It also created the offence of rape and sexual assault as a gender neutral offence, both in terms of perpetrators and victims, in ‘everyday contexts’ as well as the aggravated rape cases (e.g. gang rape and custodial rape cases).

Demands for legal changes are often an immediate response to social issues, especially in the area of gender based violence, but even moderate ‘successes’ – such as the inclusion of the custodial rape clause and the repeal of the ‘past sexual history’ clause – are often rendered useless where social attitudes regarding women’s sexuality remain unchanged. Legal intervention, even where unsuccessful or partially successful, therefore, must be seen as part of multiple strategies within the Indian women’s movement which seek to challenge, redefine and reshape patriarchal conceptualizations of women’s sexuality in law and society.

Celebrating 25 years of Gender Violence Research @ Bristol Policy Studies.
Save the date: June 15th 2015.

You the man

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Geetanjali Gangoli, from the School for Policy Studies, on a novel way of changing attitudes to gender violence

There is increasing interest in the role of bystanders in preventing gender-based violence. You the Man is a 35 minute theatre- production combined with workshop that promotes bystander engagement addressing the themes of: promoting equal and respectful relationships between men and women; promoting non-violent social norms and reducing the effects of prior exposure to violence (especially on children); and improving access to resources and systems of support. The project has been used internationally in the fields of education, workplaces, local government, health and community services and the community.

 The University of Bristol’s Centre for Gender Violence and Research hosted a You the Man workshop last month led by international contributors Professor Ann Taket from Deakin University, Australia, Professor Cathy Plourde and actor Glenn Maynard. It brought together an audience of 25 local practitioners and policy makers. This group comprised advocates (such as Next Link, the Bridge, Bristol Rape Crisis),  local community networks and agencies (including Bangladeshi Association, the Barton Hill Settlement), youth organisers (such as the Prince’s Trust), Bristol City Council and representatives from Bristol University and UWE.

The 35 minute one man play is based on responses and fears expressed by six men responding to the dating violence experienced by a young woman university student, Jana. It highlights the seriousness of unhealthy relationships and dating violence and how early intervention by family and friends may be able to help victims in these situations.

The play was followed by a panel discussion involving Professor Ann Taket, Professor Cathy Plourde, Glenn Maynard, Dr Geetanjali Gangoli, Dr Christine Barter (expert in intimate partner violence in teenage relationships), and Shabana Kauser-Iqbal from Women’s Aid and the Sky Project, an expert in BME communities. Having originated in Australia, the play was critiqued by the audience as to its ‘translatability’ into a UK context and more specifically to BME and/or sexual minority communities. Having already been effectively translated from its original American setting to an Australian setting, it was considered to be suitable for adaption to a UK audience (with further consultation with minority groups) – and particular interest was shown in introducing the play in university settings.  The audience heard about evaluations undertaken showing that the play was effective in changing attitudes to sexual and domestic violence in both the short and long term. Queries were raised about the need for support services not only for victims of sexual and domestic violence, but also for family members and friends; such support was said to exist to a limited degree in Bristol.

The play is a powerful and simple tool, requiring minimal resource. It can be effective as part of the strategy towards prevention of gender-based violence, increasing awareness, providing resource information, and changing attitudes to sexual and domestic abuse. This workshop is the first step to enable us in the Centre for Gender and Violence Research to build on our existing networks with practitioners and policy makers. It could be effectively used in conjunction with existing local programmes on reducing and preventing gender-based violence. We anticipate that such an initiative has potential to demonstrate long term impact and to change local policies.

GGDr Geetanjali Gangoli organised and moderated the workshop on behalf of the Centre for Gender and Violence Research. The workshop was supported by PolicyBristol, where this post was first published

Emma Williamson, Senior Research Fellow in the School for Policy Studies, discusses gendered violence

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010-savile

People around the World are currently engaged in 16 days of activism against gendered violence.  Communities across different nations are challenging the inequality which some men interpret as an excuse to violate and oppress those, predominately women and children, who are more vulnerable than themselves.

This image is being used with permission from J.Fleming

This is a global phenomenon which has landed in the middle of our city of Bristol. I drove past the Premier Inn on my way to work this morning.  The same hotel where last week it was revealed that a young, vulnerable, girl of 13 had been raped and sexually abused by a group of men who had been grooming her for sexual exploitation.  That building used to house Bristol Social Services.

It is possible that I have met this young woman, or someone like her, during the course of our research on the needs of homeless women or in the recent evaluation of a nearby Child Sexual Exploitation project.

She could be Jasmine, not her real name, who we first met when she was 19.

But when I got kicked out the last time, that was the only person who I could go to … but he’s on like a paedophile thing, he’s on the sex offenders for life … and he’s just not right in the head. […] Not … he never done nothing to me … or that I know about … cos he could have done it when I was asleep … but I never felt safe there. It was just horrible. (Jasmine, age 19)

When we spoke to her again, she told us

When I think back to that I do get very paranoid thinking he might have put stuff in my drink and … cos I just would not put it past him.  And … but I try not to think of it, cos I’d never find out now. (Jasmine, age 19)

When Jasmine told us about this she did so with a resignation and matter of fact honesty.  She genuinely does not know, on that occasion, if she was sexually assaulted or not.  The rest of Jasmine’s story has an inevitability about it, for example she told us about both her current and ex- ‘boyfriend’:

One time my ex-boyfriend, he hit me before … this was like proper punches to the head … never got the police involved when I should have.  But this one’s a bit different – although he’s physical, he’s like in your head.  That’s what he’s more like – he tries brainwashing you. (Jasmine, age 19)

And about how she coped with alcohol and drugs:

I know it sounds stupid, but I was just thinking a bit religiously and thinking it’s not natural, this is not what God like wanted you to do – take drugs and drink all the time. There’s got to be more to life than that (Jasmine, age 19).

Speaking with older homeless women, the vast majority of whom had experienced domestic or sexual violence throughout their lives and used alcohol and drugs as a coping strategy, demonstrates how the abuse of vulnerable girls and women continues overtime with immeasurable personal costs.

Blossom was 52 when we spoke to her:

[…] this person I’d known from last year, […] he harassed me going along the road, he wouldn’t leave me alone … he said “I need to talk to you” … and the outcome was I was assaulted […] And you see the thing is I knew him when I had nowhere to live, and I stayed there for a night.  And people don’t realise how vulnerable you are when you have nowhere to go. […] you’re vulnerable to all sorts of people.  And believe me I’ve met people that are not nice, and they take advantage of the situation. (Blossom, age 52)

Or Daisy and Ginger who spoke to us about staying in a mixed homeless hostel:

[…] the mixed [shelter], it ain’t safe in there because being women, sometimes I’d get a lot of attention from men, you know?  […] you don’t like waking up in the night getting touched or things going that shouldn’t be going on, you know what I mean?   (Daisy, age 30)

Yeah it’s mostly men, there’s only four women there.  It can be a bit agitating, cos the men there think they can just grab you when they’re drunk and do what they like, you know, but they can’t really can they? (Ginger, age 49)

The Bristol case yet again highlights the abuse and exploitation of vulnerable girls but it also challenges us all, as a society to reconsider how we respond to victims and how we all contribute to the reality in which abusive behaviours, across the continuum from wolf whistling to rape, are experienced and understood.

Whilst the media is rightly abhorred by the rape and sexual exploitation of young vulnerable girls, it doesn’t ask about the wider dynamics of gender and power which contribute to such abuse taking place.  When exploited girls talk about perpetrators as their ‘boyfriends’ it is in a context where society teaches young women to judge their self-worth on the basis of women’s objectification in the eyes of men.  Where they are bombarded by objectifying images on a daily basis in our newspapers, on TV, and on the cover of magazines.  Where senior executives from one of our national TV stations think it is ok to represent the harassment and abuse of women as tongue in cheek comedy entertainment.

In Bristol we have a council that sanctions licenses for sexual entertainment venues – whilst simultaneously seeking to educate young people in the city about respectful relationships. What we need to realise is that the violence and abuse experienced by women and children is inextricably linked to gender and inequality.  If we fail to challenge the latter, we fail to address the root causes of abuse and let victims and survivors down.

Dr Emma Williamson

Anyone who wishes to donate to a local Bristol charity which works with vulnerable women in relation to sexual exploitation might wish to donate to:

http://one25.org.uk/

http://www.sarsas.org.uk/

 

Understanding Gender Based Violence within national and international contexts

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GG NANadia Aghtaie and Geetanjali Gangoli from the Centre for Gender and Violence Research in the School for Policy Studies introduce their new book

The endemic, universal and multifaceted nature of gender based violence is what drives the work of the Centre for Gender and Violence Research (CGVR), at the School for Policy Studies, University of Bristol. Through our recent book (Aghtaie, N. and Gangoli, G. eds (2014) Understanding Gender Based Violence. National and international contexts. Routledge), we aim not only to contribute to scholarly debates on gender and violence,  but also to showcase some of the pioneering and original research conducted by members of the CGVR.  All the chapters in this book have contributions from current and former members of staff or post graduate research students attached to the CGVR.

While the Centre was formally created in 2009, members of the Centre have a long history of researching gender based violence at a local, national and international level, and feeding this into policy and practice. The CGVR grew organically from the Violence Against Women Research Group (2003) that emerged from the Domestic Violence Research Group (1990).All the members of the CGVR identify as feminist, and have a personal passion to end GBV, and our research has always originated from this desire.018

The CGVR works on all forms of GBV and interventions challenging it, and explores how violence, gender and power operate within intimate partner, interpersonal and structural violence, for example in the context of domestic abuse, prostitution and trafficking for sexual exploitation of women and girls, rape and sexual violence, domestic violence and disabled women and gender based violence for BME communities, young people’s experiences of intimate partner violence, online and offline,  same sex domestic violence and abuse, and international and comparative research on gender based violence, in a variety of contexts.

Based on the varied research conducted by members of the CGVR, the book aims to highlight the continuing, pervasive and varied nature of gender based violence in a range of countries and contexts, such as the UK, India, Iran, Rwanda and China. The chapters in the book focus on the importance of context and structure both nationally and internally The book both builds on, and expands on existing research, theories and methodologies on the issue; as well as, enters into some under researched geographical areas; and issues, such as children’s and young people’s experiences and attitudes to gender based violence and disability and domestic violence.

The book gives a taste of the many projects, studies, international reach and contributions to theories and practice of the CGVR. The Centre is now one of the largest research centre on gender based violence in Europe. Ultimately we believe and hope that the work done by the Centre does and will contribute to a more egalitarian society, where women, men and children, are free of the pressures to ‘do gender’ and are free of violence and abuse. This is, in our view, the core of feminist research.

The book will be launched on the 3rd December 2014 at the Common Room, 8 Priory Road, Bristol.  All welcome – book here!