Sexual Violence

In this second issue for 2019, we present the inaugural Student Showcase that spotlights popular culture scholarship from undergraduate and graduate students around the world. The research presented in the journal range from the depiction of Muslim women by Marvel Comics and the fans who perform as Elvis in the United Kingdom.

Many myths about masculinity are surely untrue, so they are just myths. But some are not untrue, so they are kind of social reality that male power have constructed and is reconstructing.  Pornography is both means with which male power constructs our reality, and result of male dominance which it constructs. Sexual violence is mediated by both and mediate both.  The three elements construct and reconstruct one another, and constitute the male power in a mutual and contradicted way. Therefore what we need is not only deconstructing of the myths, but also destructing of male power and changing our social reality.

This essays collected in this cluster reimagine the modern working woman from the vantage of #metoo, tracing her navigation of networks of power—from domestic work to education, from the hospital to the Hollywood studio—in literature, film, and visual culture. The modernist backstory to #metoo forces us to confront workplace harassment as part of a much wider terrain of patriarchal power—one that is, in many ways, the ground of twenty-first century life, including in the academy. It also challenges us over our forgetfulness of women’s history, of earlier cultures of harassment as well as earlier strategies of activism; it also asserts the importance of feminist memory, including as an animating force in our labor as feminist scholars.

A inicios de los años ochenta el autor y cineasta latinoamericano Julio García Espinosa en su libro Una imagen recorre el mundo (1982, UNAM) relata sobre el cine latinoamericano no comercial y su dura situación frente al imperio de Hollywood. Añadía que sin distribución equiparable a sus películas, este cine era influenciado por modas europeas que se alineaban dentro de una narrativa experimental y muchas veces de difícil acceso al gran público de las salas de cine comercial, sí estas películas llegaban allí. Es interesante pensar que en aquellos años Espinosa referenciaba a este “tercer cine” marginal: término que impulsaron en los cincuentas figuras del cine argentino como Octavio Getino, Fernando Solanas y el brasileño Glauber Rocha. Aquí estas películas le debían su militancia a un cine revolucionario y con un afán de ser reflexivo ante el espectador cuyo marcaje es una clara antítesis al cine comercial de la época. En nuestros días, este cine latinoamericano se inscribe como una posibilidad de expresión fílmica que se abre paso entre el marketing del festival de cine, luchando frente a la marea de grandes producciones y otras tantas con poca reflexión temática en sus guiones.

Violence nestles cozily and intimately at the very heart of the Christian story. From the execution of a Jewish man named Jesus through the Pauline letters, passion narratives, and martyrologies, violence appears at the crux of what came to define Christianity for many in the ancient world, and plays a central role in soteriological ideas that distinguished Christianity from neighboring belief systems at a very early date.  This story of violence is intimately connected to one of power and empire, collective-identity, and narrative. As so many scholars have shown, it is also embedded in discourses of gender: concerns about the relationship between gender, power, and authority weave themselves through early Christian writings, both canonical and extra-canonical. This chapter will interrogate the associations and implications of violence and gender in what came to be regarded as early Christian writings, including some that were eventually rejected as heretical by the imperially sanctioned church.

An open access version of full article can be found here: https://cdn.ymaws.com/www.apaonline.org/resource/collection/D03EBDAB-82D7-4B28-B897-C050FDC1ACB4/FeminismV19n1.pdf

This article analyzes the issue at the heart of the viral social media “Me Too” campaign (#MeToo) that began in the fall of 2017: disclosure. Survivor disclosure is a key defining feature of the campaign that distinguishes it from other anti-violence campaigns—including Tarana Burke’s original version of Me Too.  Unlike previous anti-violence campaigns, #MeToo relies exclusively on survivor disclosure to educate the general public about issues of sexual violence. This article examines how #MeToo’s reliance on disclosure has led to moral dilemmas for survivors, and a moralization of survivorship itself. Section I outlines the central features of both versions of the Me Too movement—Burke’s original version and the viral #MeToo version—paying careful attention to how #MeToo has departed from Burke’s original movement. Section II focuses specifically on the issue of disclosure in #MeToo. I argue that the impetus to disclose has created a moral hierarchy of survivors, with survivors who publicly disclose being given greater moral standing than survivors who remain silent. Finally, in section III I recommend #MeToo realign itself with the priorities of Burke’s original Me Too movement, which is to provide resources for survivor healing—especially survivors from marginalized communities. Ultimately, I argue that in order to be truly inclusive of all survivors, #MeToo must expand beyond mere disclosure.

The United Nations (UN) is an international humanitarian and peacekeeping organization that emerged out of the bloodshed of the two world wars in the first half of the twentieth century. Over its decades of operation, the UN has continually evolved and has been forced to reinterpret the meaning and methods of its original mandate to prevent war and foster peace through the enforcement of human rights among the world’s diverse nations. Nevertheless, many modern scholars and critics have argued that humanitarianism and peacekeeping efforts, as they are perceived and carried out today, implicitly contain outdated notions of Western superiority, paternalism, and neo-colonial attitudes. These underlying ideologies are partially to blame for the rampant culture of impunity in alleged cases of sexual abuse by UN peacekeepers in many different regions around the world.

A tese de doutoramento tem como objetivo investigar os efeitos decorridos da emergência das pessoas com deficiência, em especial as com deficiência intelectual, em sujeitos de direitos sexuais e reprodutivos. Busca também compreender os paradoxos e os dilemas envolvidos na ampliação dos direitos à sexualidade para uma população que é social e juridicamente tomada como vulnerável e incapaz. Por fim, busca compreender a gramática pela qual direitos e políticas públicas relativas à saúde sexual e reprodutiva, como também as políticas de enfrentamento ao abuso e a violência sexual, são formuladas e acessadas. Para tal realizei uma pesquisa etnográfica em duas frentes. Uma delas toma a Lei Brasileira de Inclusão de 2015, bem como outros diplomas legais a ela atrelados. A outra analisa quatro casos de interrupção legal de gestação realizados em uma política pública de atenção e cuidado às mulheres em situação de violência sexual. Desse modo, ao realizar esse empreendimento etnográfico, coloco em perspectiva modalidades de gestão médico-jurídicas sobre os direitos e as formas de exercício da sexualidade por meio de uma economia moral e gramáticas emocionais sustentada por noções de dor, sofrimento e vulnerabilização.

From the early days of the Internet, online pornography was an immensely successful industry, with a consequent phenomenal increase in both production and consumption of cyber porn. Prior to 1995, Anti-porn feminists were working to legally censor violent pornography. They received considerable resistance internally from pro-porn feminists arguing from the perspective of rights and free speech.

The exponential increase in pornography consumption has inspired significant psychological research on the possible implications of cyber porn consumption on gendered expectations and attitudes. This research adds a theoretical and historical component to research exploring cyber porn as cultural contributor to social and sexual gendered beliefs that may result in violent behaviors such as cyber harassment. Using Greg Urban’s theory of cultural motion and Michel Foucault’s theories on sexuality and disciplinary practices, this thesis analyzes discourses surrounding the motion of pornography—before and after the Internet—investigating potential consequences of pornography on the social construction of gender and misogynistic social behaviors.

According to Urban, the internalization of cultural beliefs is directly proportional to exposure and frequency of contact with a sensibly tangible form he calls an object. Objects are conductors of social beliefs, myths, and messages. According to Foucault sexuality has become an instrument of oppression (rather than liberation). This thesis argues that pro-porn feminists underestimated the impact of pornography on the social construction of gender, and traces the cultural motion of pornography from 1981-2015 analyzing forces influencing cultural motion.

Urban asserts we are now in an age of modern culture that focuses on newness and mass dissemination. Objects of traditional culture can adapt by cleverly reforming with new technology. As a historical object that has existed for centuries, pornography contains traditional culture that has transitioned with remarkable success into modern culture. The Internet is a space that has revolutionized dissemination as mass production and consumption. Consumer statistics support the hypothesis that present day pornography consumption in Western culture is normalized among young people and particularly men.

This theoretical discourse analysis supports the hypothesis that pornography directly influences gender role construction that negatively impacts both men and women.
This research was limited to the theoretical realm and relied on qualitative data from other studies. Further research is required on how the proliferation, anonymity, and accessibility of pornography is currently contributing toward a radical social construction of gender, unanticipated by the earlier feminist theorists.

El presente  artículo  pretende  ser un  aporte  al  campo  del  estudio  de  los  medios  de comunicación  de  las  zonas  periféricas  alejadas  del  centro  del  país,  particularmente  en  el contexto  local de Salta.  Esto resulta  importante porque el espacio de mediático  es uno de  los ‘campos de interlocución’ (Grimson, 2001) donde se reafirma y se disputa el poder de la representación  lo  cual  permite  construir  y  configurar  visibilidades  sobre la  realidad, estabilizando ciertos sentidos sociales sobre el mundo y su funcionamiento (Reguillo, 2007).
El  objetivo  consistió  en  indagar  cómo  los  principales  diarios  de  circulación  digital  de  la provincia configuraron diversas representaciones sobre la violencia sexual contra las mujeres a inicios de 2019, teniendo en cuenta las particularidades de las condiciones de producción de la información  (Verón,  1989)  que  estuvieron  signadas  a  nivel  local  por  la  declaración  de Emergencia  Pública  en  materia  de  Violencia  de  Género  (Ley  provincial  Nro.  7863)  ante  los elevados índices  de femicidios y violaciones que presenta Salta, siendo  una de las provincias con  la  mayor  cantidad  de  casos  del  país  por  cantidad  de  habitantes;  mientras  que  a  nivel nacional, durante 2018, hubo una ascendente visibilización de la violencia sexual en la agenda pública de Argentina, entre otros temas, en el marco del debate por la aprobación de la Ley de Interrupción Voluntaria del  Embarazo y de la conmocionante denuncia mediática  y judicial por violación  que  realizó  la  actriz  Thelma  Fardín  contra  el  actor  Juan  Darthés,  hecho  ocurrido durante una gira teatral cuando ella era menor de edad.

My paper deals with social issues connected to sexuality and structural violence in a selection of ballads. It is well known that many ballad narratives are acted in a framework of patriarchal gender-power structures. These structures are of different strength in different places and times and might be reversed in e.g. jocular songs. Family or clan patterns, representative of pre- or early modern periods in Europe and other places, have put their stamp on songs that have been performed through several centuries, and are still performed.

There are many examples of abuse and rape as a ballad theme, and women ballad actors are often being punished with violence and death for being born as sexual beings and potential child-bearers, and for getting out of control.  Pregnancy and adultery are often severely punished, whether as results of rape or not, and also male protagonists breaking the rules of the prevailing gender-power system may be met by violence.

In this paper I will look especially at the so-called honour killing motive and related actions in a couple of ballads among the Scandinavian and English-Scottish corpuses, e.g. “Konung Valdemar och hans syster” (TSB D 346) and  “Lady Maisry” (Child 65). One aim is to partake in an on-going discussion on gender issues in the KfV, which is represented by a number of articles in earlier volumes of BASIS. I will analyse a couple of ballad variants where the “honour” motif is discernible and raise a couple of questions. What kind of society is mirrored in the ballads? Do we know in which periods in history these ballads have been sung, by which singers and among what kind of audience? Can we gain any knowledge from the different narrative endings in different versions about singers’ views and attitudes? And what can these ballads tell us today, in modern or late modern societies which are still plagued by the existence of honour-related violence and hierarchical gender-power patterns?

The Sexual Harms and Medical Encounters Research Hub (SHaME) and École française d’Athènes are pleased to share details of a one-day conference taking place on 18 October 2019 at the École française d’Athènes in Athens, Greece.
This one-day conference has been organised to better our understanding of sexual violence in Greece, Britain, the US, and France and is focused on three themes:
1. Histories of sexual violence and the law in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries
2.  Medical communities and sexual harms from the 1960s
3. Therapeutic interventions into sexual abuse
More information about the conference, including confirmed speakers and the full programme, can be found on: https://shame.bbk.ac.uk/events/sexual-violence-laws-communities-interventions/

Este artículo analiza dos productos audiovisuales escritos y dirigidos por mujeres, Por tu bien y Néixer, que constituyen un material imprescindible para informar y concienciar sobre el problema de la violencia obstétrica presente en los servicios de atención a la maternidad en España. En la primera parte del estudio se examina la definición del concepto y su tipología con el objetivo de esclarecer los criterios que la determinan como tal. Seguidamente se hace una exposición de cómo la progresiva concienciación sobre el problema gracias a los grupos activistas del parto respetado, la literatura generada sobre el tema y el cambio de mentalidad operado en los profesionales de la salud han contribuido a visualizar y luchar para erradicar el problema y sus consecuencias. En la segunda parte se analiza en qué medida ambos productos audiovisuales más allá de su objetivo didáctico, reflexivo y denunciatorio, representan formas de resistencias a la violencia y al biopoder, además de productos de empoderamiento y solidaridad entre las mujeres.

This article is based on the results of a survey of Orthodox Youth in Kenya and their attitudes about sex, abortion and domestic violence. This survey was taken of the participants of an all-Kenya Orthodox youth conference held in western Kenya in August of 2016. The results give insight into the participants' sources for first learning about sexual matters, as well as the sources that are preferred today. The youths' perception of the Orthodox Church's handling of sexual matters and sexual education is also revealed. Difficult moral issues facing Orthodox Kenyan youth are raised, such as premarital sex, domestic violence, the impact of HIV-AIDS on behavior, and responses to unintended pregnancy, with results providing insight as to how Orthodox youth are navigating the challenges facing them as they grow up into modern life both as Kenyans and as Orthodox Christians. After relating the story told by each set of survey results, conclusions are drawn from each of the issues addressed, with suggestions made as to a way forward, or further questions to pursue.

Representations of utopia are often streamlined into being an end goal, a concrete vision for a better
future. For mainstream sexual violence response organisations, utopia is largely simplified into being
a world without sexual abuse, and the path to this utopia is breaking the silence to end the violence.
Using utopic theory, this article will unpick this concentration, and suggest a re-direction towards the
granular parts of utopia. Davina Cooper’s concept of everyday utopias will be utilised, alongside the
radical work of adrienne maree brown and Walidah Imarisha to highlight the positive alternatives
that lie in everyday utopian social justice practices. Drawing on the work of three groups the author
currently organises with, Hollaback! London, Sisters Uncut and the Silenced Museum, an opposition
between the teleological narrative of early feminist movements and the everyday utopianism of
grassroots organising will be drawn. In doing so the article expands upon three core practices
fostered in these groups: intersectional prefiguration, visionary fiction-ing, and everyday disruptions.
It will thus be suggested that mainstream sexual violence response organisations in the UK engage in
a process of unlearning and learning to better navigate towards an everyday utopian world free from
sexual violence.

This article engages with concerns in feminist scholarship about a decline of feminist influence in contemporary efforts to prevent, challenge and mitigate the harms of sexual violence. A key focus of these concerns has centred on co-option into the conservative regulatory apparatus of the state and concomitant depoliticisation of an issue that was a key mobilising force of the second-wave women's movement. Drawing on empirical research from a study undertaken in a local Australian field of sexual assault service provision, I argue that the narrative of feminist decline in the sector is oversimplified; rather, I have found that there is an almost naturalised relationship between feminism and the field of sexual assault service provision. In this article, I explore the core feminist epistemologies that are embedded in the structure of sexual assault services and enacted through worker practices.