Doctoral Researcher Jenna Norosky Publishes New Article on Conflict-Related Sexual Violence
Jenna Norosky, Human Security Lab doctoral researcher and PhD Candidate in Political Science at University of Massachusetts-Amherst, published an article in International Feminist Journal of Politics on gender and conflict-related sexual violence. The article, “Distinguishing between the ‘Soldier’ and the ‘Brute’: engraving hierarchies of masculinity in conflict-related sexual violence discourse,” examines how sexual violence in conflict is understood at the international level. See the complete abstract below:
On the one hand, feminists critique the securitization of conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) on various grounds, but, on the other hand, also raise concerns that the Western hyper-fixation on CRSV reproduces colonial narratives about race, gender, and sexuality. However, the productive effects of specifically Western state discourse about CRSV have yet to be fully examined in this context. How do Western states make use of the colonial gaze in constructing CRSV as an issue of grave concern, and to what ends? Further, what are the implications of this for the nexus of feminist critique and praxis? This article utilizes a macro-structural approach to discourse analysis to analyze the 2014 Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict, led by the United Kingdom. It argues that Western delegates securitized CRSV by relying on tropes of racialized men as maintaining backwards practices of gender and sexuality, and the construction of CRSV as a “pre-modern” weapon of war. This frame reproduces a racialized hierarchy of masculinity that constructs men from “conflict countries” as potential perpetrators in need of intervention, and men from “safe countries” as role models for gender-conscious militarized manhood. The article concludes by identifying potential practical implications of this discourse.
Norosky had previously presented her work at Human Security Lab’s “Global and Human Security Workshop” as well as at the Symposium on Conflict-Related Sexual Violence against Men and Boys hosted by the University of Leipzig, Germany.