Violence against women is embedded within cultural norms and the structures of society as well as felt by individual women, however one must recognize the larger power structures that perpetuate violence against women, Dhillon and Erturk/Purkayastha, in their articles, discuss this at length. “State failures to respond to the instances of abuse, and the implementation of social policies that eclipse the layered realities of Indigenous women and girls, brings into relief how the state itself is the driving force behind violence enacted upon Indigenous people historically and in the present, the primary perpetrator i fact” (Dhillon 10). Dhillon brings attention to the fact that the state itself is perpetuating violence against Indigenous women …show more content…
protecting the victims and punishing the perpetrators. There has been relatively less work done on the more general obligation of preventing violence from occurring, including addressing violence against women by supporting women’s empowerment and engaging in transformative change at the community and societal levels to eradicate patriarchal norms and values that underlie macro-structural forces of violence and the subordination of women” (Erturk/Purkayastha 146). Oppressing and marginalizing women, keeping them in subordinate positions, reinforces the strength of the patriarchy and keeps men firmly in positions of power in all facets of social life, domestically, politically, publicly, ect. The colonial power that Dhillon discusses that directly impacts and abuses Indigenous women exists across the world, everywhere impacted by colonialism. The driving force behind most colonizers, beyond a thirst for power and capital, was religion, Christianity primarily. Christianity subordinates women and girls through a benevolent guise that overtly supports violence against women in all forms. Religious patriarchy deems women should remain in their ‘place’ …show more content…
Dhillon makes the case that settler colonialism specifically targets Indigenous women and girls. Although colonialism also utilizes patriarchal tools, colonialist ideologies primarily use erasure, exploitation, and state sanctioned violence to control, violate, and erase Indigenous women and culture. Dhillon states “until we unravel the normative frameworks that structure the everyday in a settler colonial reality intent on mutilating Indigenous bodies, dislocating them, holding them in captivity, and ultimately, making them disappear” (5). This is the largest difference between the two articles. Dhillon draws attention to the fact that the goal of settler colonialism is to eradicate Indigenous bodies. Erturk and Purkayastha describe systemic violences against women and how that effects all women everywhere, the goal of patriarchy is to subordinate women, not eradicate them. The mentality of colonialism was assimilate or die and this mentality still exists on a state level, however the powers that be have found ways to make their intentions more
This misinterpretation and glorification of violence has been one of the major issues as to why inequality still exist. CONCLUSION A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence, and Power involves the issues of discrimination and injustice towards women all over the world. Former President Jimmy Carter has raised awareness to everyone in society and made them realize the pure wrongdoings that have occurred.
Jiwani and Young's argument also causes me to consider Audra Simpson's talk, "The Chief's Two Bodies," in which she discusses both how and why the eradication of Aboriginal women was necessary to the development of patriarchal colonialist society. In short, Simpson acknowledges that through the creation "status," an arbitrary blood relationship to one's Aboriginal lineage, marriage, and scrip colonialist were able to remove land "ownership" from Aboriginal women, by essentially making them invisible. In effect, Jiwani and Young reinforce and provide evidence to suggest that ideologically, the concept of Aboriginal women being invisible or contrarily "hypervisable" (899), in that they are the antithesis of the "good" Christian women (the mother, the sister, the wife, the virgin) creates a binary. These apposing ideological women cause a "moral and racialized economy of representation [that] works to privilege dominate societal norms" (Jiwani and Young, 904). What is interesting about these discursive modes is the fact that news reporting itself is a colonialist practice rooted in economic stability. These modes maintains the cycle of violence and marginalization and only counter media rooted in art, such as the "Red Dress Campaign," or the "Walking with Our Sister's Campaign" which, bring awareness to the Aboriginal perspective can act as a retaliation to standard media
In this proposal our team seeks to explore the injustices within the Indian Act. To achieve this our proposed research will examine the target population being the aboriginal woman. The paper will further explore the oppressions faced by the aboriginal women within the Indian Act. In conclusion, this proposal will sum up the negative impact that the Indian Act had on aboriginal women and how it continues to oppress this population within the Canadian National discourse.
Feminism and Indigenous women activism is two separate topics although they sound very similar. In indigenous women’s eyes feminism is bashing men, although Indigenous women respect their men and do not want to be a part of a women’s culture who bring their men down. Feminism is defined as “The advocacy of women 's rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes.” In theory feminism sounds delightful despite the approaches most feminists use such as wrong-full speaking of the opposite gender. Supposedly, feminism is not needed as a result of Indigenous women being treated with respect prior to colonization. Thus, any Native woman who calls herself a feminist is often condemned as being “white”. This essay argues that Indigenous women may
After colonization began there were countless detrimental changes to the indigenous way of life that took place. Neu (2000) discusses these detrimental changes in detail. The author accounts for the lost of their land and natural environment, the discouragement of their lifestyle focused on hunting and gathering, the separation of families via the residential school system, and the punishment received for the usage of traditional customs and language. In many ways the colonists disrespected the Aboriginal people by disregarding their fundamental needs and wants. Additionally, the process of colonization implemented some drastic gender role changes into Aboriginal culture. Colonization imposed European patriarchy, accompanied by racism and sexism, on the matriarchal Aboriginal cultures. As a result, the Aboriginal women of Canada lost their sense of purpose and responsibility, burdening them with less respect and power compared to the men. This loss contributed to many negative effects for these women and made them feel a strong sense of cultural estrangement.
...eoples as uncivilized and potentially violent in hopes of promoting the view that the forced separations of Native peoples from their lands and the murderous practices that pursued were inevitable as part of the hegemonic system (Carleton, 2011, p.111). Currently, social studies standards often take on a tone of detachment, focusing on political actions and court rulings rather than examining how these actions consequently affected the lives of Native Americans (Shear, 2015, p.88). This serves to disillusion students on the affairs of Native American conditions, keeping Native Americans locked in history and in the hindsight of American people. By furthering their frameworks, I will illustrate how these colonial discourses negatively impacted Native Americans in their fight for civil liberties and continue to negatively impact them today in their fight for awareness.
According to Smith, sexual violence “is not simply a tool of patriarchy, but also a tool of colonialism and racism” (Smith 2005, 8). As a result, women are being forced to suffer abuse, which damages their identity. Because of colonialism, Native women often find themselves forced into silence around sexual and domestic violence in their communities. By staying silent about sexual and domestic violence, Native communities are “able to maintain a united front against racism” (Smith 2005, 1). Accordingly, Native women are constantly being marginalized in patriarchal discourses regarding racism, colonialism, and white supremacy discourses. Historically, it is mentioned that sexism is the inability of both patriarchy and white supremacy discourses,
Green argues that the prevalence of violence within Aboriginal women is an example of the residual effects of colonization, where “low valuation of women and women’s work has been laid over Aboriginal values” (Green 333). The violence experienced by Adelaine highlights the effects of colonial attitudes towards Aboriginal woman. The active questioning of this cycle of violence, and eventually her speaking out against it, is textual proof of Adelaine’s ability to fight back against colonial attitudes.
This marginalizes indigenous women beyond any reasonable expectation of security of life and person (Indigenous politics, 2005). This paper will discuss the conceptualization of structural violence, gender analysis and how Aboriginal women experiences structural violence in the light of three themes which are; health issues, socio-economic setbacks and lack of participation in policy making and governance (this can also be seen as social injustice). These three themes are interconnected (intersectionality of gender inequality). The social location of violence proposes that there are several composite and interconnected factors which occur at myriad social and cultural contexts that has kept women vulnerable to violence (Samantroy, 2010). This paper will also look at intervention strategies that can help minimize structural violence directly affecting Aboriginal women in
Her book focuses on the myriads of issues and struggles that Indigenous men and women have faced and will continue to face because of colonialism. During her speech, Palmater addressed the grave effects of the cultural assimilation that permeated in Indigenous communities, particularly the Indian Residential School System and the Indian Act, which has been extensively discussed in both lectures and readings. Such policies were created by European settlers to institutionalize colonialism and maintain the social and cultural hierarchy that established Aboriginals as the inferior group. Palmater also discussed that according to news reports, an Aboriginal baby from Manitoba is taken away every single day by the government and is put in social care (CTVNews.ca Staff, 2015). This echoes Andrea Smith’s argument in “Heteropatriarchy and the Three Pillars of White Supremacy: Rethinking Women of Color Organizing” that colonialism continues to affect Aboriginals through genocide (2006, p. 68). Although such actions by the government are not physical acts of genocide, where 90% of Aboriginal population was annihilated, it is this modern day cultural assimilation that succeeded the Indigenous Residential School System and the Indian Act embodies colonialism and genocide (Larkin, November 4,
Gender-based violence is made possible by the ideology of sexism in Indian traditional culture which argues that women are worth less than men in the sense of having less power, status, privilege, and access to resources that is more prevalent in middle class and low caste families.
I have been taught that Christianity is a loving religion that cares for all, But this is not always the case. Upon reading, among other theological works, “Quest for the Living God” by Elizabeth A. Johnson, it becomes apparent that Christianity has been used to systematically marginalize women throughout history despite the teachings of the Bible. While it might not be intentional, the negative treatment of Women has been ingrained into Christian teachings over hundreds of years.
In specific, she interrogates the notion of gender itself and how it leads to constructed oppression and continued false inferiority by genders, sexes, and races. Her article is a critique of Anibal Quijano's theories. Lugones challenges Quijano's theory because it is constructed in and reproduces several problematic colonial ideas of sex and gender. The Arvin et al. piece, Decolonizing Feminism: Challenging Connections between Settler Colonialism and Heteropatriarchy, confronts the continued colonization of native people's in the United States. Moreover, the article analysis how how "settler colonialism" and heteropatriarchy are linked, benefit and grow through one another. The argument in this article states that Women's and Gender studies and Native Studies cannot continued to be siloed nor fooled into believing they are separate issues if we (feminists) ever hope to see the end of a heteropartriachal state; and therefore end settler
Women in Pakistan are mistreated and abused on a daily basis. The punishments many women who live in this female oppressed country undergo are cruel and unusual in nature. Punishments such as acid attacks, being whipped, being burned, raped, or killed. Although many believe this would apply to all women it mainly just applies to the middle and lower class. The higher class also known as the “elite” class has an advantage being much more educated, and wealthier. The “elite” class owns property and does not hesitate to seek a divorce and to remarry. Due to the fact they are so high up in the economy, they are fully reinforced and protected by the power of their family and community. Not all Pakistani woman can experience the “elite” lifestyle. For the woman who don’t experience this lifestyle, they often live in fear. For example, a woman could not leave her house without th...
Violence against women appeared from a long time ago and happened in every country. It caused pain in both mental and physical for women. There were so many people trying to stop this problem but it was still not completely fixed. There are many reasons that lead to this issue all over the world. After many surveys and investigations, we realized that the main reason is Discrimination and Unequal power. Some legends and stories in the past made people think men’s role is more important than women’s role in society. And because men are stronger, more active than women so they can do more work. This also makes people think men deserve more rights than women. They soon forced on human’s mind that men are also...