CANS 406 Lecture Notes - Lecture 15: Transactional Sex, Hegemonic Masculinity, Masculinity
22 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Sexual and Gender-Based Violence II
Trigger warning: strong mention of rape, sexual violence, abduction, etc.
Contd. last class
-Cohen argues that rape/sexual violence is not necessarily used as a military strategy like
affecting ethnic cleansing
-She finds that it has more of a socialization/bonding effect in groups where there was
forced recruitment and less social cohesion
-To Cohen, in Sierra Leone, rape = combatant socialization
-Women are often portrayed as victims of SGBV and men as perpetrators, but 24% of RUF
female abductees were involved in 1 in 4 reported gang rapes
-In the DRC, 41% of SGBV victims reported female involvement
-Cohen defines perpetrator very broadly: people who may be involved in finding victims,
holding them down, not just actually physically inflicting the violence
-Women fighters face similar social pressures within armed groups, and also have to become part
of these forces by protecting and proving themselves – Cohen notes that their participation only
seems surprising because of the gendered assumptions we have about women’s capacity to
commit violence
-Cohen: where there are higher rates of female abduction into forces, the more women will be
involved in SGBV
-Women seem to rarely perpetrate SGBV on their own or instigate it – they participate in male-
led attacks
-Little evidence that men felt shame in conducting this behavior in front of women, or
that women’s presence had a deterring effect
-In this way, Cohen’s research counters the idea that involvement of women would reduce
numbers of SGBV cases
-Many women of the perpetrators in Sierra Leone were themselves abducted and raped when
brought into the RUF – their involvement in perpetrating SGBV could be a way of protecting
themselves from further attacks
-This forces us to question our assumptions about the possibility of having distinct lines between
victims and perpetrators
-Complex victimhood, complex survivors
-Carpenter notes that forms of wartime of SGBV affect men and boys strongly, not just women
as we would assume
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Trigger warning: strong mention of rape, sexual violence, abduction, etc. Cohen argues that rape/sexual violence is not necessarily used as a military strategy like affecting ethnic cleansing. She finds that it has more of a socialization/bonding effect in groups where there was forced recruitment and less social cohesion. To cohen, in sierra leone, rape = combatant socialization. Women are often portrayed as victims of sgbv and men as perpetrators, but 24% of ruf female abductees were involved in 1 in 4 reported gang rapes. In the drc, 41% of sgbv victims reported female involvement. Cohen defines perpetrator very broadly: people who may be involved in finding victims, holding them down, not just actually physically inflicting the violence. Cohen: where there are higher rates of female abduction into forces, the more women will be involved in sgbv. Women seem to rarely perpetrate sgbv on their own or instigate it they participate in male- led attacks.
