Tamsin Bradley

Emma Tomalin

Mangala Subramaniam

This exciting new volume debunks overly simplistic conceptions of Dowry. Taking a variety of theoretical and active approaches, this work bridges the gap between today's prevailing theory and practice, whilst taking South Asian women's own experiences as a starting point to any discussion. Bringing a unique diversity of perspectives from leading academics and activists, this book opens up the term "Dowry" to undertake a study of its role in various communities across the world from the practice of "mehr" among Muslim societies, the role of the dowry in Bangladesh, and its position in the wider diasporic populations globally. The groundbreaking, multidisciplinary book is essential reading for students, policymakers, practitioners and activists alike.

Bridging the Gap between Theory and Practice

Dowry

Brenda Bartelink

Chia Longman

This book takes religion as an entry point for a deeper exploration into why practices of gender-based violence continue and what possible actions might help to contribute to their eradication. International donors are committed to reducing and ending gender-related harm, particularly violence against women, but clear answers as to why harmful practices persist are often slow to emerge. Theological research struggles to find strong links, yet religion is often referred to by local people as the reason for practices such as female cutting, male circumcision, early and forced marriage, nutritional taboos and birth practices, mandatory (un)veiling, harmful spiritual practices, polygamy, gender unequal marital and inheritance rights and so-called honour crimes. This book presents empirical cases of religious, non-religious and secular actors, including local and international governmental and non-governmental agencies in the fields of development, health and equality policies. Tracing their different understandings of how religion is entangled with gender-based violence both contextually as well as historically, the book sheds light on helpful and unhelpful as well as erroneous and harmful understandings of such practices in local and global perspectives. Centralising the perspectives of women themselves, this book will be an important read for development practitioners and policy makers, as well as for researchers across religious studies, gender studies, and global development.

Global and Local Responses to Harmful Practices

Religion and Gender-Based Violence

As the movement to end all forms of violence against women and girls (VAWG) gains momentum around the world, this provocative new work applies an innovative theoretical lens to gendered violence across a wide variety of countries and contexts. Global Perspectives on Violence against Women and Girls engages with VAWG in the UK and across the global South, including case studies from India, Pakistan and South Sudan. Considering various forms of violence including harmful cultural practices such as FGM to Early Child Marriage, dowry and bride price related harassment, stranger rape, work-based harassment, Intimate Partner Violence and other forms of domestic violence, this important volume creates an original critical lens by combining the ecology model, the intersectional approach and a spectrum designed to identify the range of different forms of VAWG in a given context. Arguing for a greater understanding of the local political and cultural contexts in which VAWG is allowed to flourish, Global Perspectives on Violence against Women and Girls is one of the few works to give due prominence to local women's organizations in the global South and beyond, who it argues must ultimately play the leading role in ending VAWG. At a time when the fight against violent misogyny finds itself at a critical turning point, this volume makes a substantial and timely contribution towards the ultimate goal of ending VAWG.

Global Perspectives on Violence against Women and Girls

Is the practice of FGM on the rise in the UK and US? Why? What happens to religious and cultural traditions when they are taken from their context into a new, often secular, state? Women, Violence and Tradition is a fascinating look into the life histories of women from ethnic minority communities in the West, focusing specifically on their experiences of under-researched cultural practices. The book gives close insight into how ethnic minority women today navigate between their religious and cultural traditions and the secular state in which they live. The volume illuminates areas of tension and difficulty when some women actively try to reform aspects of their tradition whilst remaining furiously loyal to their cultural identity. Other examples highlight how young women are choosing to endorse traditional practices, seeing this as an important way of demonstrating the legitimacy of their religion and culture in the face of increasing hostility. This brave and original book tackles the sensitive and controversial issue of female genital mutilation, as well as surveying changing attitudes and practices around marriage and divorce. Using a cross-cultural perspective the book draws on the views of activists and community organisations who work with women to confront injustice.

Taking FGM and Other Practices to a Secular State

Women, Violence and Tradition

Bridging the Gap Between Theory and Practice

Janet Gruber

Prevention of Violence Against Women and Girls argues that women and girls are vulnerable across all areas of society, and that therefore a commitment to end violence against women and girls needs to be embedded into all development programmes, regardless of sectorial focus. This book presents an innovative framework for sensitisation and action across development programmes, based on emerging best practices and lessons learnt, and illustrated through a number of country contexts and a range of programmes. Overall, it argues that SDG 5 can only be achieved with a systematic model for mainstreaming an end to violence against women and girls, no matter what the priorities of the particular development programme might be. Demonstrating how the approach can be applied across contexts, the authors explore cases from the energy sector, health and humanitarian intervention, and from countries as varied as South Sudan, Myanmar, Rwanda, Nepal, and Kenya. Drawing on nearly three decades of experience working on gender, health, and violence against women programmes as both practitioners and academics, the authors present key lessons which can be used by students, researchers, and practitioners alike.

Mainstreaming in Development Programmes

Prevention of Violence Against Women and Girls

India's endemic gender-based violence has received increased international scrutiny and provoked waves of domestic protest and activism. In recent years, related studies on India and South Asia have proliferated but their analyses often fail to identify why violence flourishes. Unwilling to simply accept patriarchy as the answer, Tamsin Bradley presents new research examining how different groups in India conceptualise violence against women, revealing beliefs around religion, caste and gender that render aggression socially acceptable. She also analyses the role that neoliberalism, and its corollary consumerism, play in reducing women to commodity objects for barter or exchange. Unpacking varied conservative, liberal and neoliberal ideologies active in India today, Bradley argues that they can converge unexpectedly to normalise violence against women. Due to these complex and overlapping factors, rates of violence against women in India have actually increased despite decades of feminist campaigning. This book will be crucial to those studying Indian gender politics and violence, but also presents new data and methodologies which have practical implications for researchers and policymakers worldwide.

Tamsin Bradley

Books

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