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Sociology Research

 

Violence against women affects almost 1 in 5 women across the world, and has risen over the past 20 years. This violence takes various forms ranging from rape, domestic emotional and physical abuse, female infanticide, sex-selective abortion, forced trafficking, and sexual harassment. These cut across the public-private divide, affecting women in families, workplaces, police custody, educational institutions, and various public spaces. The causes of such forms of violence are complex, but scholars working on this issue agree that it is one of most important public health crises facing women across the globe, yet has received the least attention and resources to address it. Violence reinforces unequal gender relations, and can have strong consequences on emerging conceptions of masculinity among young men.

The project Infrastructures of Gendered Violence, led by Dr Manali Desai, examines comparative urban gendered violence in India, Pakistan and South Africa, tracing the connections between economic liberalization, shifting gender relations and public infrastructures which enable unsafe spaces for women, and exacerbate violence. The aim of the two-year project is to create a cross-disciplinary dialogue between feminist scholars, practitioners and institutions in the three countries through focused workshops that will be held in Delhi, Johannesburg, Lahore, and Cambridge.