[URBANTH-L] Call for Contributions: Gender-Based Violence and Front-Line/Local Workers

[wiesj at xavier.edu]

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Request for Contributions

Volume Abstract: To Be Titled Upon Receipt of Chapter Abstracts
Hillary J. Haldane (University of California- Santa Barbara) and 
Jennifer R. Wies (Xavier University)

        As our attention to structural violence and inequalities 
continues to grow, our understandings of local level violence and the 
systems responsive to such violence must also develop.  Through 
theorizing the “local” and placing the local at the center of inquiry, 
this volume examines ethnographic examples of the front-line political 
economies of gender-based violence service provision.  By exploring 
the situations of front line workers and local sites of service 
provision, this text reorients the analysis of gender-based violence 
to the interface between the state and the victims: the front-line 
workers.  By recentering the analysis to the local, we hope to 
revitalize our studies of front line workers in the gender-based 
violence field.          
        This volume contains three sections that represent three 
fields of service provision to gender-based violence victims.  The 
first is the medical and/or public health arena, where gender-based 
violence victims and front line workers direct service providers 
interact at the level of physician-patient, medical advocate-victim, 
and mental health counselor-client.  The second point of contact is 
located in the legal and criminal justice system, where gender-based 
violence victims encounter lawyers, legal advocates, and law 
enforcement personnel.  The final intersection of analysis is that of 
the education system.  Education systems produce gender-based violence 
workers in the classroom, via conferences trainings, and through 
orientation into organizations working to provide services to victims 
of gender-based violence.  In addition, the intersection between the 
education system and gender-based violence workers serves as a site of 
examining the creation of public educatio
n and awareness regarding gender-based violence and allows an analysis 
of ways that gender-based violence issues are framed for public 
consumption.
        The significance of this volume collection is that it brings 
together scholars in a conversation that might not necessarily be in 
dialogue with each other.  In this volume scholars connect their work 
to macro theories of structural violence and illuminate the 
disjuncture between transnational theory and local practice.  This 
framework mimics a larger framework of front line gender-based 
violence work that is conducted at multiple sites of service.  As 
front line workers strive to coordinate services to victims of gender-
based violence, the scholars in this volume follow their example and 
transcend disciplinary artificial boundaries to mirror what is 
occurring “on the ground.”  
        Beginning with an introduction that reviews the 
Anthropological work focusing on gender-based violence and front line 
service provision, the volume presents four essays within each of the 
three sections.  Each section contains a summary of the essays and 
highlights the possibilities for theoretical and practical 
collaborations.  The concluding chapter demonstrates the theoretical 
and applied benefits of an analysis of structural violence from the 
vantage point of front-line labor.

Please submit a note of interest as soon as possible to Jennifer Wies, 
PhD (Xavier University) at wiesj at xavier.edu.  Abstract drafts will be 
due by year's end.


*********************
Jennifer R. Wies, PhD
Director, Xavier University Women's Center
3800 Victory Parkway
Cincinnati OH 45207
513-745-3737
513-745-3999 (fax)
wiesj at xavier.edu

The Xavier University Women's Center is located at 1415 Dana Avenue, 
ML #7780.