Critical Research Methods Seminar Series - Working with Survivor Narratives: Feminist Ethics in Sexual Violence Research
When:
—
Venue:
Online
Working with Survivor Narratives: Feminist Ethics in Sexual Violence Research
Speaker: Dr Tanya Serisier
MeToo is a contemporary manifestation of a longstanding truism within feminism; that women’s experiences of sexual violence provide the epistemological and political core of feminist activism and scholarship in this area. Famously, however, the feminist historian and cultural theorist, Joan W. Scott has reminded us that experience is not a transparent window onto reality, but that our experiences are shaped through the discursive conditions that surround them. Extending this argument, the communication of experience involves practices of narration, of in the words of survivor and memoirist, Patricia Weaver Francisco, ‘giving truth the shape of a story’. These narratives are also, as Me Too made clear, part of a genre, with its own recognisable tropes and conventions. Indeed, survivor, memoirist and philosopher, Susan Brison has described survivor narratives as structured through a ‘reverse conversion narrative’ where a ‘perfectly good, intact, life was destroyed, then painstakingly pieced back together again’. In this paper I think through the necessity and challenges of working with survivor narratives and experiences of sexual violence, thinking through my own attempts to analyse and think through survivor narratives as part of an ethical feminist research practice around sexual violence.
About the Speaker
Dr Tanya Serisier is Senior Lecturer in Criminology at Birkbeck University. Her research explores the cultural politics of sexuality and sexual violence from a feminist and queer perspective. She has published widely on feminism, sexual assault and survivor politics, including in her critically acclaimed 2018 book, Speaking Out: Feminism, Rape and Narrative Politics. Her current research examines conceptions of sexual pleasure and danger under neoliberalism, with a particular focus on the cultural politics of sexual consent.
Critical Research Methods Seminar Series
This event is part of the Critical Research Methods Seminar Series (CRMSS), a new seminar series convened by the Department of Criminology at Birkbeck. Our Department has a proud tradition of conducting theoretically grounded empirical research, and our staff and postgraduate research students work at the intersections of feminist, queer, race critical and postcolonial theory, political economy and psychosocial studies. CRMSS aims to provide a dedicated space for dialogue about how research methods can be used to carry out socially engaged research which enquires into the ways that injustices manifest through power relations, and the practicalities of conducting such research. The events are open to Birkbeck staff and current Birkbeck students
Please note that this event is open only to Birkbeck staff and current Birkbeck students. Booking is required via this page. The event will be hosted on Blackboard Collaborate, a free to access website. You will be sent a link to access the event upon registration.
Contact name:
Megan McElhone