Book Review: Preventing Sexual Violence: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Overcoming a Rape Culture edited by Nicola Henry and Anastasia Powell

Encyclopedia of Rape and Sexual Violence is a two-volume work that tackles a very important and sensitive topic using historical and current events, the law, and statistical information to educate on sexual violence and its impact on society. It contains twenty chapters, arranged alphabetically, that extensively discuss the different forms of rape and sexual violence. The entries are well researched, thorough, and objective in tone, and they feature prominent legal cases, statistics, and events that are pertinent to the selected topics.

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Introduction

Texts after Terror ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190082314.003.0001 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-7

Author(s):

Rhiannon Graybill

Keyword(s):

Sexual Violence ◽

Hebrew Bible ◽

Affect Theory ◽

Biblical Studies ◽

Rape Culture ◽

New Approach

The Hebrew Bible contains many accounts of rape and sexual violence. Feminist approaches to these stories remain dominated by Phyllis Trible’s 1984 book Texts of Terror. This chapter and book offer a new approach, drawing on feminist, queer, and affect theory and offering new readings of biblical rape stories, including Dinah (Gen 34), Tamar (2 Sam 13), Lot’s daughters (Gen 19), Bathsheba (2 Sam 11), Hagar (Gen 16 and 21), Daughter Zion (Lam 1 and 2), and the Levite’s concubine (Judg 19). In place of “texts of terror,” this chapter opens the possibility of reading after terror. The approach offered here also engages contemporary activism against sexual violence and rape culture, bringing them to bear on biblical studies.

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Transforming Campus Rape Culture

Collaborating for Change ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190071820.003.0002 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 23-46

Author(s):

Diane Crocker ◽

Marcus A. Sibley

Keyword(s):

Sexual Violence ◽

Complexity Theory ◽

Rape Culture ◽

Narrative Methods ◽

Institutional Responses ◽

Dominant Narratives

This chapter explores how rape culture, as a concept, is used to mobilize efforts to reduce campus sexual violence. While rape culture is not simple, institutional responses assume it is. This insight is informed by complexity theory. Rape culture is a complex context that does not respond well to solutions that assume static, cause–effect relationships. The chapter describes a Canadian project that used narrative methods to solicit stories about rape culture from students and invited them to code their own stories and how they would characterize aspects of their experiences. The chapter explores how students make meaning of and understand rape culture in contrast to dominant narratives in research and advocacy. Additionally it explores the students’ stories’ themes to illustrate limitations inherent in current efforts to transform campus rape culture.

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