Gender-Related Violence: What Can a Concept Do?

Abstract

This paper explains the logic for using the concept of gender-related violence (GRV) as a broad category that problematises homophobia, transphobia and the policing of gender norms and the gender binary, as well as gender-based violence—understood as primarily violence against women and girls (VAWG). It then evaluates the utility of this concept and its capacity to introduce theoretical refinement to the study of gendered violence, by reviewing its reception within a large international feminist project on gendered violence in the lives of children and young people. The aim of this study was to improve knowledge and understanding of forms of violence and discrimination among practitioners who have everyday contact with general populations of children and young people. It sought to improve their ability to identify and challenge sexist, sexualising, homophobic or transphobic language or behaviour, and their knowledge of how and when to refer children and young people to appropriate support. The paper reports my view of the contribution that the concept of gender-related violence made in each of the four project sites: Ireland, Italy, Spain and the UK. The findings are mixed: in Spain and the UK the concept seemed helpful, but in Italy and Ireland it was initially expected to be helpful but, in practice, a conceptualisation closer to gender-based violence plus homophobia was employed. It is tentatively concluded that where LGBTQIA+ rights were well-established as well as the problematisation of VAWG, this framework was successful, but that it was less successful in more heteronormative sites where homophobia was less problematised. It is suggested that, as a concept, GRV can make a valuable intervention in sites like the former.

Tackling Gender-Related Violence: How Can Theory Inform International Professional Education Projects?

“…The first day's training focused on defining and identifying gender-related violence, and on examining the values and norms structuring the social contexts in which it occurs. In this respect, it had similar politics and theory to the Spanish training and its inspiration from the Nordic norm criticality work within sex education is described in Alldred (2023).…”

“…This article gives a fuller description of this action project than previously published (although the full funder report has been available throughout, on the project website until 2020 and on the above one since) and offers background to some specific discussions on theoretical, legal or translation-related issues (e.g., Alldred 2023;Fox and Alldred 2022;guizzo et al 2017;Jiménez et al 2016) and highlights the methods and approaches taken to sharing feminist theory with practitioners (see also .…”