NCJ Number
178004
Journal
Sociological Spectrum Volume: 18 Issue: 3 Dated: July-September 1998 Pages: 263-284
Date Published
1998
Length
22 pages
Annotation
Data from 20 in-depth interviews with women who had experienced sexual abuse or sexual assault were used to examine victim attitudes; results revealed that these women regarded themselves as survivors, although this construction was defined against dominant representations of victims
Abstract
Scholars and critics from diverse fields have advanced various arguments about the nature and representation of victimhood and victims; they construct victimhood as a state of powerlessness. Constructionist arguments recognize an ideology undergirding victim constructions, but they do not explicitly engage with postmodern debates on the workings of disciplinary power. The present research aimed to determine whether being a victim of violence was a central aspect of the identity of victims who were also activists against sexual violence. The research also sought to determine the motivations and impacts of participation in the feminist antiviolence movement. Participants were recruited from requests posted on web sites, flyers posted in the author's community, social networks, and snowball sampling. The interviews explored the effects of sexual violence on the women's lives, their self-perceptions, and their antiviolence activism. Results revealed that the majority of participants had been involved in organizing and speaking at Take Back the Night events. Participants usually identified themselves as survivors, but this term had meanings ranging from emerging from the event alive to an earned status. The overall profile of these women was that of people who did not dwell on the negative aspects of their victimization and who focused instead on their personal strength and empowerment through activism. Findings suggested that regarding victim or survivor identities as being respectively devoid of power or possessing power, detracts from the productive and normalizing effect of the actual power. Recommendations for further research and 43 references (Author abstract modified)