Understanding Sexual Violence examines the structural supports for rape in sexually violent cultures and dispels a number of myths about sexual violence--for example, that childhood abuse, alcohol, and drugs are direct causes of rape.

Understanding Sexual Violence examines the structural supports for rape in sexually violent cultures and dispels a number of myths about sexual violence--for example, that childhood abuse, alcohol, and drugs are direct causes of rape.

This book situates the complexity of violence within its broader context and covers a wide span of sexual violence including sexual harassment, bullying and murder as well as domestic violence.

Sexual violence has become a topic of intense media scrutiny, thanks to the bravery of survivors coming forward to tell their stories. But, unfortunately, mainstream public spheres too often echo reports in a way that inhibits proper understanding of its causes, placing too much emphasis on individual responsibility or blaming minority cultures. In this powerful and original book, Linda Martín Alcoff aims to correct the misleading language of public debate about rape and sexual violence by showing how complex our experiences of sexual violation can be. Although it is survivors who have galvanized movements like #MeToo, when their words enter the public arena they can be manipulated or interpreted in a way that damages their effectiveness. Rather than assuming that all experiences of sexual violence are universal, we need to be more sensitive to the local and personal contexts – who is speaking and in what circumstances – that affect how activists’ and survivors’ protests will be received and understood. Alcoff has written a book that will revolutionize the way we think about rape, finally putting the survivor center stage.

Victims of sexual assault experience their trauma in different ways, and often one path to recovery and healing is right for one person, but not right for another. While there are some general mental health effects of sexual violence, this book outlines and describes the impact of particular types of sexual violation. Whether the survivor has experienced childhood sexual abuse, sexual assault during adulthood, marital rape, sexual harassment, sex trafficking, or sexual violence within the military, they will find aspects of her experience in these pages. Once survivors understand the ways in which they have been affected, they are introduced to various pathways to surviving sexual violence and moving forward. The chapters provide case examples and specific activities which give a fuller description of the ways survivors can make use of the particular approaches, which include mind-body practices, counseling, group therapies, self-defense training, and others. Anyone who has been a victim of sexual violence, or knows and cares about someone who has, will find relief in these pages, which offer practical approaches to finding balance and healing.

Integrating interdisciplinary and cross-cultural analysis, this volume advances our understanding of sexual violence in intimacy through the development of more nuanced and evidence-based conceptual frameworks. Sexual violence in intimacy is a global pandemic that causes individual physical and emotional harm as well as wider social suffering. It is also legal and culturally condoned in much of the world. Bringing together international and interdisciplinary research, the book explores marital rape as individual suffering that is best understood in cultural and institutional context. Gendered narratives and large-scale surveys from India, Ghana and Africa Diasporas, Pacific Islands, Denmark, New Zealand, the United States, and beyond illuminate cross-cultural differences and commonalities. Methodological debates concerning etic and emic approaches and de-colonial challenges are addressed. Finally, a range of policy and intervention approaches—including art, state rhetoric, health care, and criminal justice—are explored. This book provides much needed scholarship to guide policymakers, practitioners, and activists as well as for researchers studying gender-based violence, marriage, and kinship, and the legal and public health concerns of women globally. It will be relevant for upper-level students and scholars in anthropology, sociology, psychology, women’s studies, social work and public and global health.

This book takes an innovative approach to using narrative therapy in counselling people who have been subject to childhood sexual abuse. Reclaiming Lives from Sexual Violence presents an illustrative case study of the authors, Tim the therapist in consultation with Dale the client, who was sexually abused as a child by a clergy member. The book is unique in documenting their therapeutic work using transcripts taken directly from their sessions together. This narrative approach invites the reader to consider different ways of engaging in therapy in order to challenge the dominant social discourses around masculinity and shame. Looking at shame from a position of value awareness rather than a deficit perspective, this book extends counselling to consider the individual experience as political and one that must be shared outside the one-to-one therapy environment. This will be an essential resource for beginning or established therapists and practitioners working with clients who have been victims of sexual violence.