The Politics of Discourse in Sexual Abuse Narratives

Although sex is considered something private and personal, telling sexual stories is by no means a personal matter. The difficulty faced by sexual abuse victims who want to tell their stories is due to the ways in which the meanings of sexual abuse, the abuser and the victim are discursively constructed by the dominant culture. As a result, a tension between the individual desire to tell stories and the social injunction to silence is invariably found in women’s narratives of sexual abuse. This paper explores how discourses of the dominant culture discourage women from breaking their silence about sexual abuse and how the emerging voices of sex abuse victims have led to the reevaluation of discourses, power, and female subjectivity. My discussion will be divided into two parts: the first part—’Talking Back’—will focus on sexual abuse narratives written by female survivors’ and the second part —’Public Confession’ — will examine survivors discourse broadcast in television programmes.

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Child Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church

Criminal Justice and Behavior ◽

10.1177/0093854808314470 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 35 (5) ◽

pp. 658-678 ◽

Cited By ~ 23

Author(s):

Michael D. White ◽

Karen J. Terry

Keyword(s):

Sexual Abuse ◽

Child Sexual Abuse ◽

Catholic Church ◽

Excessive Force ◽

Police Organization ◽

Sex Abuse ◽

Police Deviance ◽

The Individual ◽

The Church ◽

The Catholic Church

The Catholic Church response to its sexual abuse crisis and how the problem should be addressed parallels the “rotten apple” assertions of police deviance. The rotten apple theory, however, does not fully explain police deviance, as there are often also structural explanations. This article employs Kappeler, Sluder, and Alpert's (1998) police deviance framework to characterize and understand the Catholic Church sex abuse scandal, drawing specific comparisons to the intentional use of excessive force by police. Though the analogy has limitations, there are similarities at both the individual and organizational levels, particularly because the Church has implemented accountability mechanisms similar to the police. The article concludes with a discussion of lessons the Church can learn from the police organization as they seek to prevent, control, and effectively respond to sexual abuse of children by their clergy.

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Online Child Sexual Victimisation

10.1332/policypress/9781447354505.001.0001 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Corinne May-Chahal ◽

Emma Kelly

Keyword(s):

Sexual Abuse ◽

Social Context ◽

Child Sexual Abuse ◽

The Internet ◽

Rigorous Approach ◽

The Social ◽

Type Of Abuse ◽

Sexual Abuse Victims ◽

Measurement Practices

Focusing on online-facilitated sexual abuse, this book takes a rigorous approach to existing literature to address some of the most pressing public and policy questions on this type of abuse. The book examines which children are most vulnerable, how their vulnerability is made, what they are vulnerable to and how we can foster resilience. It begins with an overview of online child sexual abuse. Victims are made both by the acts perpetrated on them and by the social context in which these acts take place and the consequences that are felt. The book examines online-facilitated child sexual abuse research through the lens of this social context, which contains multiple definitions of what is childhood, sex, and abuse as it connects to the Internet. The book calls for greater clarity and agreement on definitions and measurement practices concerning online child sexual victimisation. In conclusion, it recommends that guardianship responsibility is extended to children themselves and considers some of the technical tools that might assist their participation.

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The moral duty to reduce the risk of child sexual abuse

Human Affairs ◽

10.1515/humaff-2019-0015 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 29 (2) ◽

pp. 188-198

Author(s):

Sergei Levin

Keyword(s):

Sexual Abuse ◽

Child Sexual Abuse ◽

Preventive Measures ◽

Moral Duty ◽

Individual Risk ◽

Health Issues ◽

Sex Abuse ◽

Moral Duties ◽

Child Sex Abuse ◽

The Individual

Abstract Child sexual abuse and paedophilia are ethically loaded public health issues. This paper looks at whether there are any specific moral duties related to paedophilia. I argue that the moral duty not to commit child sex abuse is universal and that the duty to reduce the individual risk of child sex abuse is specific to paedophiles. A paedophile is a person who is sexually attracted to children. Some paedophiles commit child sex abuse offences, but others are able to refrain from doing so and have the rational capacity to take adequate preventive measures. The risk of committing child sex abuse and the ability to reduce that risk are a moral duty pertaining specifically to paedophiles. I further argue that society has a moral duty to help paedophiles to fulfil that duty. Unfortunately, societies rarely provide such opportunities and hence fail in their moral duty towards paedophiles and children.

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Telephone consultancy in adolescent psychiatry: an audit

Irish Journal of Psychological Medicine ◽

10.1017/s0790966700015962 ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

pp. 15-20 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Declan Finnian Sheerin

Keyword(s):

Sexual Abuse ◽

Social Work ◽

Conduct Problems ◽

General Practitioners ◽

Adolescent Psychiatry ◽

Community Resources ◽

Counselling Service ◽

The Social ◽

Sexual Abuse Victims

AbstractObjective: An audit was carried out to evaluate the performance of a telephone consultancy service in adolescent psychiatry. Its objective was to answer the following questions: What does a telephone consultancy service actually do? Is it worth having? If so, how can we improve it? Method: Proforma data sheets on 69 consecutive calls to the Telephone Consultancy Service over a 16-month period were analysed. Results: Seventy-seven percent of enquirers used the service to request a referral or to ask about the appropriateness of referral but only 46% of enquiries were responded to in this way. Twenty-two percent of enquiries were given counselling or advice on how to proceed with the cases themselves. Almost 50% of calls came from the social work department and they enquired principally about conduct problems (27% of their calls) and sexual abuse victims (18% of their calls). General practitioners infrequently used the service (7 calls over a 16-month period). Conclusions: These findings appear to indicate that a telephone consultancy service can provide a counselling service and highlight community resources that may be overlooked by other agencies. However, infrequent use of the service by general practitioners suggests that there has been poor dissemination of information about the service – therefore it is important to bolster awareness of the service itself on a periodic basis amongst potential users.

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Masking the self: Understanding the link between eating disorders and child sexual abuse

Qualitative Social Work ◽

10.1177/1473325017714532 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 18 (2) ◽

pp. 247-264

Author(s):

Lisa Hodge ◽

Lia Bryant

Keyword(s):

Eating Disorders ◽

Sexual Abuse ◽

Child Sexual Abuse ◽

Gender Politics ◽

The Self ◽

Female Subjectivity ◽

Women's Voices ◽

Permanent Damage ◽

Women's Narratives ◽

Medical Discourses

The discourses of child sexual abuse and eating disorders are inextricably shaped by gender politics. Medical discourses conceptualise abuse as resulting in permanent damage to the personality and continue to draw on the notion of hysteria when explaining anorexia. Yet the circulation of such pathologising discourses masks aspects of female subjectivity and leave other explanations unexplored. We argue that women make decisions and experience eating disorders beyond these privileged understandings. Indepth interviews, artwork and poetry are obtained from seven women and a feminist application of Bakhtin’s sociological linguistics is used to gain deeper insights into meanings and emotions. Our argument will unfold in three sections: Masking Emotions; The Mask Representing Powerlessness; and Revising the Self. Collectively the data reveals how gendered discourses dominate the women’s narratives when making claims about the self. Although these women’s voices are largely marginalised in society they nevertheless disrupt authoritative discourses on child sexual abuse and eating disorders.

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Liberté d'opinion et limite normative dans une représentation sociale: le développement de l'intelligence 1Ce texte reprend l'essentiel d'un exposé présenté en juin 1998 à la Faculté de Psychologie et des Sciences de l'Education de Genève, à l'occasion de la collation du Doctorat Honoris Causa de l'Université de Genève à l'auteur.

Swiss Journal of Psychology ◽

10.1024//1421-0185.58.3.201 ◽

1999 ◽

Vol 58 (3) ◽

pp. 201-206 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Claude Flament

Keyword(s):

Social Representations ◽

The Social ◽

The Individual

This paper is concerned by a possible articulation between the diversity of individual opinions and the existence of consensus in social representations. It postulates the existence of consensual normative boundaries framing the individual opinions. A study by questionnaire about the social representations of the development of intelligence gives support to this notion.

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