Call for Abstracts: Gender-Based Violence in Public and Private Spaces: Dismantling Barriers and Creating Safety

Call for abstracts (up to 300 words) 

Submission deadline: End of 10 February 2023

All abstracts and enquiries to: isjc@uos.ac.uk

Hosted by the Gender and Sexual Minorities and Trauma, Injustice, Violence and Abuse themes at the Institute for Social Justice & Crime.

Context and themes

At a time when the boundaries between public and private spheres are increasingly blurred and contested, questions about how we define and frame different forms of gender-based violence in relation to space are more pressing than ever.

The historic ‘privatisation’ of domestic abuse and sexual violence perpetrated in the confines of the home contrasts sharply with still-prevalent myths linking rape and child sexual exploitation to deviant – and often socially/culturally Othered –  strangers. Equally, although the global Me Too movement brought renewed focus to sexual violence as a shared problem that must be collectively confronted, neoliberal discourses of individual prudence and safekeeping continue to silence victim-survivors and suppress reporting.

This event will explore themes relating to gender-based violence and space. We invite abstracts on topics including, but not limited to, the following:

·      Gender-based violence as a continuum – what work is the separation of ‘domestic’ and ‘public’ acts of violence doing, and how useful is this framing when developing responses? How should we understand differences and commonalities across the continuum?

·      Digital spaces

·      Policing and legislating the ‘private’ – problems and innovations

·      Whose safe spaces? Exclusion, discrimination and barriers to support

·      Collective efficacy and creating safer communities

·      Public shaming, ‘honour’ based abuse and mobbing – complicity, surveillance  and cultures of impunity

·      Social deviance and ‘Othering’ – gender-based violence and the cultural outsider

·      Institutions and built environments

·      Borders and boundaries

We particularly welcome submissions from early career and underrepresented researchers, and on underresearched topics. We also welcome submissions from DARNet and VAWGRN members.

·       Abstracts should be submitted as a Word or PDF attachment of no more than 300 words. 

·       If you would like to be considered for an honorarium should your abstract be selected, please note this in your email.  

·       Authors of selected abstracts will be informed by no later than end of 20 February 2022.