Women abuse : exploring women's narratives of violence and resistance in Mitchell's Plain
type: CreativeWork
description: Woman abuse is a pervasive social problem and there is a paucity of South African research exploring women's experiences of violence. This study focused on how women endure abusive relationships by examining how women construct and give meaning to their experiences, within a particular socio-cultural context. Interviews were conducted with 15 participants who volunteered participation in response to advertisements. All research participants resided in Mitchell's Plain or surrounding areas. In-depth, narrative interviews were used to investigate women's experiences of violence from their partners. The interview topics included women's daily concerns and problems, their experiences of and responses to their partners' violence, and their feelings toward their partners and staying in the relationships. The interviews lasted approximately one to two hours and were tape-recorded and transcribed. The interview data was analysed by utilising a narrative approach, taking the content of women's stories into account. A close attention to language and discourse also shaped the analysis of women's narratives. In their narratives, women named their experiences of violation and abuse, explored the impact of abuse, and discussed their help-seeking attempts. Women also constructed particular gendered identities for themselves and their partners. Hegemonic gendered identities were sometimes adopted or resisted and reflected contradictory subjective experiences. This study showed how women in abusive relationships utilised a variety of strategies to end the violence in their lives and challenged constructions of women as passive victims of abuse. The meanings women attached to their experiences of abuse were filtered through the particular socio-cultural context (characterised by poverty and deprivation) within which their experiences occurred. An important contribution of this study was the acknowledgement that change occurred as a result of the abuse. Women named their experiences o…
abstract: Woman abuse is a pervasive social problem and there is a paucity of South African research exploring women's experiences of violence. This study focused on how women endure abusive relationships by examining how women construct and give meaning to their experiences, within a particular socio-cultural context. Interviews were conducted with 15 participants who volunteered participation in response to advertisements. All research participants resided in Mitchell's Plain or surrounding areas. In-depth, narrative interviews were used to investigate women's experiences of violence from their partners. The interview topics included women's daily concerns and problems, their experiences of and responses to their partners' violence, and their feelings toward their partners and staying in the relationships. The interviews lasted approximately one to two hours and were tape-recorded and transcribed. The interview data was analysed by utilising a narrative approach, taking the content of women's stories into account. A close attention to language and discourse also shaped the analysis of women's narratives. In their narratives, women named their experiences of violation and abuse, explored the impact of abuse, and discussed their help-seeking attempts. Women also constructed particular gendered identities for themselves and their partners. Hegemonic gendered identities were sometimes adopted or resisted and reflected contradictory subjective experiences. This study showed how women in abusive relationships utilised a variety of strategies to end the violence in their lives and challenged constructions of women as passive victims of abuse. The meanings women attached to their experiences of abuse were filtered through the particular socio-cultural context (characterised by poverty and deprivation) within which their experiences occurred. An important contribution of this study was the acknowledgement that change occurred as a result of the abuse. Women named their experiences o…
author: Boonzaaier, Floretta
language: eng
date published: 2001
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:23:47Z
provider: University of Cape Town
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: Department of Psychology

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/13904