EXTERNALLY FUNDED RESEARCH PROJECTS
Australian women’s discursive constructions of the lived experiences of domestic violence
Background
One of the key difficulties of addressing domestic violence in the Australian context is that definitions of domestic violence vary considerably among stakeholders, including across support service providers. Another significant issue to consider in an Australia context is the high proportion of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) people, who are often the subject of distorted and inflammatory domestic violence media coverage.
Aim
This project will focus on women’s experiences of domestic violence across a range of CALD populations, while also examining how the Australian media (re)constructs and shapes contemporary discourses of domestic violence.
Methods
This project employs a three-stage qualitative research design underpinned by the theoretical frameworks of intersectional feminism and post-structuralism. Foucauldian discourse analysis will be used to analyse data. Stage 1 will be a secondary analysis of newspaper texts. Stage 2 will involve conducting a series of one-to-one interviews with CALD women who have experienced domestic violence, particularly examining if and how their cultural identities have impacted on their experiences or their access to or uptake of domestic violence support services. Stage 3 will involve examining cultural sources of domestic violence information to understand how domestic violence is constructed among CALD communities.