The Art of Resistance in Islam

Based on first-hand ethnographic insights into Shi'i religious groups in the Middle East and Europe , this book examines women's resistance to state as well as communal and gender power structures. It offers a new transnational approach to understanding gender agency within contemporary Islamic movements expressed through language, ritual practices, dramatic performances , posters and banners. By looking at the aesthetic performance of the political on the female body through Shi'i ritual practices – an aspect that has previously been ignored in studies on women's acts of resistance -, Yafa Shanneik shows how women play a central role in redefining sectarian and gender power relations both in the Middle East and in the European diaspora.

Innovations in implementing a health systems response to violence against women in 3 tertiary hospitals of Maharashtra India: Improving provider capacity and facility readiness

Background Violence against women [VAW] is an urgent public health issue and health care providers [HCPs] are in a unique position to respond to such violence within a multi-sectoral health system response. In 2013, the World Health Organization (WHO) published clinical and policy guidelines (henceforth – the Guidelines) for responding to intimate partner violence and sexual violence against women. In this practical implementation report, we describe the adaptation of the Guidelines to train HCPs to respond to violence against women in tertiary health facilities in Maharashtra, India. Methods We describe the strategies employed to adapt and implement the Guidelines, including participatory methods to identify and address HCPs’ motivations and the barriers they face in providing care for women subjected to violence. The adaptation is built on querying health-systems level enablers and obstacles, as well as individual HCPs’ perspectives on content and delivery of training and service delivery. Results The training component of the intervention was delivered in a manner that included creating ownership among health managers who became champions for other health care providers; joint training across cadres to have clear roles, responsibilities and division of labour; and generating critical reflections about how gender power dynamics influence women's experience of violence and their health. The health systems strengthening activities included establishment of standard operating procedures [SOPs] for management of VAW and strengthening referrals to other services. Conclusions In this intervention, standard training delivery was enhanced through participatory, joint and reflexive methods to generate critical reflection about gender, power and its influence on health outcomes. Training was combined with health system readiness activities to create an enabling environment. The lessons learned from this case study can be utilized to scale-up response in other levels of health facilities and states in India, as well as other LMIC contexts. Plain language summary Violence against women affects millions of women globally. Health care providers may be able to support women in various ways, and finding ways to train and support health care providers in low and middle-income countries to provide high-quality care to women affected by violence is an urgent need. The WHO developed Clinical and Policy Guidelines in 2013, which provide guidance on how to improve health systems response to violence against women. We developed and implemented a series of interventions, including training of health care providers and innovations in service delivery, to implement the WHO guidelines for responding to violence against women in 3 tertiary hospitals of Maharashtra, India. The nascent published literature on health systems approaches to addressing violence against women in low and middle-income countries focuses on the impact of these interventions. This practical implementation report focuses on the interventions themselves, describes the processes of developing and adapting the intervention, and thus provides important insights for donors, policy-makers and researchers.

Shared Parenting after Separation and Divorce in New Zealand

<p>Shared parenting after separation or divorce is an intricate, fluid process in which gender, power and ideology are implicated. The dominant focus of the literature is on sharply polarised assessments of the value of joint custody or shared parenting, and on the elaboration of the individual moral qualities ideally required by each parent which will help ensure the arrangement's success or failure. This thesis, however, addresses the systemic (individual and social) isssues, and the processes of family life which facilitate or complicate the arrangement. The conclusions indicate that it it is inappropriate to view shared parenting as that form of custody which necessarily safeguards the child's best interests. Rather, it should be viewed as one among several possible modes of custody; and that the particular outcome for any family of a choice of shared parenting after separation depends largely on the ability of those parents to manage their relationship, in which systemic, as well as personal factors are significant. The value of detailed qualitative research as a means to explore and understand areas of family life and relationships is demonstrated, in particular because of its power to reveal the complexity of family process. The crucial material evidence is the transcription of the unstructured, intensive, longitudinal interviews which generates texts suitable for a close textual reading or deconstructive analysis. Such an analysis opens for inspection the way that experience and the respondents' and researcher's textual production is constructed from and by gender, power, ideology, ambivalence, and process. It highlights the way in which elements of experience are often divided from each other and held separate as a consequence of the research act" and their interrelatedness obscured and destroyed. The use of deconstructive qualitative analysis has facilitated a further redefinition of the researcher/respondent relationship. It has emphasised the importance of creating typologies which, within a specific category, can encompass a diversity of experiences and positions. It has challenged the usual mode of sociological writing in which only the authorial voice is present, and has indicated the significance of allowing a range of voices to enter the text, thus emphasising the uncentredness of the social world.</p>

Shared Parenting after Separation and Divorce in New Zealand

<p>Shared parenting after separation or divorce is an intricate, fluid process in which gender, power and ideology are implicated. The dominant focus of the literature is on sharply polarised assessments of the value of joint custody or shared parenting, and on the elaboration of the individual moral qualities ideally required by each parent which will help ensure the arrangement's success or failure. This thesis, however, addresses the systemic (individual and social) isssues, and the processes of family life which facilitate or complicate the arrangement. The conclusions indicate that it it is inappropriate to view shared parenting as that form of custody which necessarily safeguards the child's best interests. Rather, it should be viewed as one among several possible modes of custody; and that the particular outcome for any family of a choice of shared parenting after separation depends largely on the ability of those parents to manage their relationship, in which systemic, as well as personal factors are significant. The value of detailed qualitative research as a means to explore and understand areas of family life and relationships is demonstrated, in particular because of its power to reveal the complexity of family process. The crucial material evidence is the transcription of the unstructured, intensive, longitudinal interviews which generates texts suitable for a close textual reading or deconstructive analysis. Such an analysis opens for inspection the way that experience and the respondents' and researcher's textual production is constructed from and by gender, power, ideology, ambivalence, and process. It highlights the way in which elements of experience are often divided from each other and held separate as a consequence of the research act" and their interrelatedness obscured and destroyed. The use of deconstructive qualitative analysis has facilitated a further redefinition of the researcher/respondent relationship. It has emphasised the importance of creating typologies which, within a specific category, can encompass a diversity of experiences and positions. It has challenged the usual mode of sociological writing in which only the authorial voice is present, and has indicated the significance of allowing a range of voices to enter the text, thus emphasising the uncentredness of the social world.</p>

The Role of Gender Power Imbalances in the Spread of HIV among Women in Intimate Relationships: Guidelines for Social Work Practice

Gender power imbalances and HIV are concerns that affect women globally. Social workers are ethically committed to help people affected with HIV and thereby promote gender equality. Although the literature has documented the nexus between gender imbalances and HIV, scant research explores these problems concurrently within the social work profession. Drawing on the resource theory and gender and power theory, this article undertook a qualitative exploratory to gain insights into women's perspectives on gender power imbalances as a risk factor for HIV transmission in rural communities of Ngaka Modiri Molema District, North West Province. Purposive sampling was used to recruit participants while data was collected through semi-structured interviews. The findings demonstrate that unequal power relations between men and women in intimate relationships negatively affect women’s lives in diverse ways. This gendered impact of HIV infections for women remains intact due to the rooted gender norms that limit their ability to protect themselves against risky sexual behavior by their male partners. Disclosure of one's status remains a complex stigma attached to HIV. Social work empowerment interventions that seek to enhance equality in intimate relationships are recommended.