Producing gender through storytelling about violence: an exploration of teenagers’ understandings of

violence

Vanita SundaramDepartment of Education, University of York

vanita.sundaram@york.ac.uk

Outline of paper

Context – social, political and methodological Aims and methodology of study Findings

- Understandings of ‘violence’

- Acceptability of violence

- Deserved and undeserved violence

- Contradictory discourses Moving forward: implications for schools and

educators

Increasing prevalence of violence among young people (13-21 year-olds)

Extreme acts of violence e.g. murder are on the rise, as intimate partner violence

Violence research indicates that young men are primary perpetrators of violence in all contexts (macro)

Historically, youth violence research in UK conducted from criminological perspective e.g. with ‘at-risk’ youth, homeless youth, offenders

Social class, ethnicity, religion, disaffection have historically been prioritised over gender in explaining youth (male) violence

In US context, a similarly ‘gender-neutral’ perspective has been adopted to analysing youth (male) violence

Context

Context

Recent UK work has explored the role of gender in relation to young people’s use/understandings of violence

- Role of normative masculinity in normalising violence within intimate relationships (heterosexual) (McCarry, 2010)

- Construction of women as vulnerable and men as dangerous impacts on women’s fear of violence (Hollander, 2001)

- Role of conservative gender attitudes in acceptance of violence (Lacasse & Mendelson, 2007)

Context Zero Tolerance Campaign (1998)Survey of >2000 young people (14-21 year-olds)20% of boys/men and 10% of girls/women think violence

is acceptable in some circumstances e.g. ‘nagging’, infidelity

75% of boys/men and over 50% of girls/women thought the woman was ‘often’ or ‘sometimes’ to blame for violence

NSPCC (2009)25% of girls and 20% of boys aged 13-17 have

experienced violence from a partnerGirls more likely to experience violence from partner as

harmful than boys and girls feel less empowered to reject violence than boys

Context

Less knowledge about why young people accept and justify the use of violence (McCarry, 2010)

This is Abuse campaign (2009) sought to raise awareness among young people but resistance to campaign was apparent

Young people on discussion boards resisted depiction of intimate partner violence as male-female; debated definitions of certain acts as ‘violent’; discussed whether some forms of violence are deserved

Violence prevention/awareness-raising tends to be premised on expert’s understanding of what constitutes (interpersonal) violence

Aims

Need to understand how young people themselves view violence

- What factors shape/influence these understandings?

Targeted prevention could seek to challenge these underlying influences on views of violence

- Including (especially) gender identities Increasing recognition of role of schools in

disrupting gender norms, including those which promote, encourage and justify violence

Aims

“A whole-school approach [is needed to] tackle attitudes that normalise violence and abuse by exploring gender stereotypes [with young people]”

Higgs, 23rd June 2011

Aims

What do young people characterise as violence? What factors influence young people’s views on

different behaviours as violent (or not)? Do young people view some forms of violence as

more or less acceptable and/or inevitable than others?

What are the underlying reasons for differential perceptions of acceptability?

Specific focus here on how gender is produced (gender stereotypes and norms) through young people’s talk about violence

Methodology

Regional study comprising 6 schools in Yorkshire Schools were purposively sampled from sampling frame of

all schools in Yorkshire on the basis of:- Gender composition- Faith - Selectiveness

Small groups (5-6) of Year 10 pupils were randomly selected in each school

Yielded total sample of ~ 70 pupils Written consent obtained from parents of all participating

pupils and pupils themselves

Variations in school ethos

Methods

Combination of open-ended questions, photographs, vignettes, statements about violence

Each vignette, photograph and statement depicted mixed-sex encounters

Every vignette and statement was presented with a female perpetrator and a male perpetrator

Photographs were presented with male-female and male-male encounters

Materials shuffled ahead of presentation so no clustering by type of material, gender of perpetrator or type of violence

Vignette

Based on Prospero (2006) and This is Abuse campaign

“Steve is playing around with his girlfriend’s phone and sees that she has received many texts from another boy in their year.

When Steve asks his girlfriend about this, she says that she should be allowed to have male friends and he should stop getting upset about nothing. Steve pushes his girlfriend and calls her a ‘slut’.”

Statement

Based on Zero Tolerance (1998) answers

PhysicalIt is acceptable for a woman to hit a man if she

knows he has been cheating on herSexualWhen a man and a woman are married, it is

acceptable for him to make her have sex with himVerbalIt is acceptable for a woman to yell at her partner if

he has done something to make her jealous

Photographs

What is violence?

Violence associated with a range of behaviours

- pushing, shouting, screaming, jealousy, name-calling

- murder, shooting, kidnapping, rape, child abuse Girls equally as likely as boys to name

emotional/verbal acts of aggression, and fighting, use of weapons and sexual assault as violence

Behaviours associated with violence were stereotypical and similar in comparison with previous studies of youth violence

Who is violent?

Violence associated primarily with young men – individuals or gangs

Classed assumptions made about violence e.g. ‘chavs’, young men with ‘aggressive dogs’ and ‘young alcoholics’

Some differences in perceptions across schools - in schools with 95%+ minority ethnic pupils,

discussions around stereotypes of certain ethnic groups as violent

Some recognition that women can be violent and emotional violence e.g. jealousy, name-calling, put-downs was frequently associated with women

Acceptability of violence

In vignettes and statements in which the perpetrator was male the violence was judged to be ‘unacceptable’ and was identified as ‘wrong’

M: It’s naughty [to hit a woman]M: He should leave her alone [..] wait until she’s

ready (in response to vignette about sexual aggression)

M: The man should be the bigger man, he should just leave it

Where perpetrator was a woman, behaviour was also defined as ‘violent’ but was seen as more acceptable

Acceptability of violence

When female was perpetrator, the violence was viewed as ‘deserved’, ‘understandable’ and as less serious

M: It was the right thing to do, to slap him

F: I think she has a good reason to slap him

M: He deserves it, well yeah, you can’t go kissing other girls when you are going out with another girl

F: It’s like, your immediate reaction, because you’re so mad at him you just go straight to slap him

Acceptability of violence

The male participants invoked narratives about a ‘feeling’ or ‘sense’ that perpetrating violence against women was wrong

Yassin: It’s a thing that we know but we can’t put into words

Particular attention was paid to the perceived danger of men’s bodies and their ability to cause harm

Women’s bodies were perceived as less capable of causing harm – their violence primarily conceptualised in terms of emotional/verbal aggression

Deserved and undeserved violence

Perceived acceptability of violence closely linked to what was considered ‘deserved’ or ‘undeserved’ violence

Assumptions made about context of violence in vignettes and photographs

- dynamic, relationship between perpetrator and victim, events leading up to violence

Where violence was narrated as ‘deserved’ it was less likely to be named as violence or justifications were provided

Deserved and undeserved violence

Violence by a man towards a woman in vignettes/statements was unanimously considered to be ‘undeserved’

However, in photographs, stories were produced to explain, rationalise and justify use of violence towards men and women

M: She must have done something wrong

F: Maybe they was in an argument…yeah..and she’d done something wrong

M: He’s been offended [..] you wouldn’t hit someone just for no reason

Deserved and undeserved violence

Justifications of violence (naming of violence as deserved or not) reflected normative expectations of gender behaviour

- expectations of a woman’s role within heterosexual relationship

- expected punishment for transgression of role- fidelity, chivalry and emotion as gendered

behaviours- men as protectors of daughters and wives- vulnerability and helplessness of women

Deserved and undeserved violence

Some young people did construct stories in which actions of female victim explained violence against them (deserved)

Actions of female victim implicitly and explicitly narrated as going against normative gender behaviour

F: She’s probably done something to hurt him [like] lied to him about something

F: He might be asking her to do something again and again which she does not want to do

F: If she turns him away and he is, like, a violent person and he feels rejected and embarrassed it could turn into a violent situation

Contradictory discourses

Contradictions between non-acceptability of all forms of violence expressed by majority of young people and internalised knowledge

Male-on-male violence was justified using essentialist argument about male bodies

- testosterone, male pride and toughness Men viewed as naturally more inclined to use violence

M: It’s all in nature, isn’t it like. I mean, throughout the animal kingdom [..] it’s just, you know, it’s inside us

Contradictions in attitudes towards violence in photographs as compared with vignettes and statements

Moving forward: the role of schools

Findings suggest that young people do understand violence in relatively conventional terms (despite resistance expressed in previous contexts)

Key role of gender norms and expectations in shaping young people’s views of violence as acceptable, deserved or undeserved

If schools are spaces in which gender norms are produced (Reay, 2001) then schools have an important role to play in challenging these behaviours in young people

Anti-violence education must focus on the production of gender identities and challenge the norms which are used to explain and even defend violence among young people

References

Burton, S., Kitzinger, J., with Kelly, L. & Regan, L. (1998). Young people’s attitudes towards violence, sex and relationships. A survey and focus group study. Zero Tolerance Charitable Trust.

Barter, C., McCarry, M., Berridge, D., Evans, K. (2009). Partner exploitation and violence in teenage intimate relationships. University of Bristol/NSPCC.

Renold, E., & Barter, C. (2003). ‘Hi, I’m Ramon and I run this place’: challenging the normalisation of peer violence in children’s homes. In: E. Stanko (ed.), The Meaning of Violence. London: Routledge.

British Educational Research Association. (2009). BERA Insights Tender Specification. (http://www.bera.ac.uk/files/2009/03/bera-insights-tender.pdf)

Prospero, M. (2006). The Role of Perceptions in Dating Violence Among Young Adolescents. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 21(4), 470-484.