Hearing hidden voices: Scottish women’s experience of domestic abuse in late twentieth-century Scotland
Andrea Thompson, University of Glasgow
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Summary
– Period when women’s aid emerged and their work
– Benefit of oral history in feminist research and underrepresented groups
- Reveal and trace hidden experiences of abuse
- Valuing the individual experience
– Scottish Women’s Aid
- Contributed a new discursive space as well as shelters and aid
– 1970s Dobashes found society still dominated by men and patriarchy
- This conditioned women’s experiences of domestic abuse and their ability to deal or escape it
– Women still forced to be financially depended on men
– Still a concern by police and organization to not break-up families, and the reconciliation more important than protection
- Broken home seen as evil and a tragedy (Glasgow Marriage Guidance Council 1963)
– Popular Discourses of alcohol and female provocation also continued to interfere with intervention for abused women
– Actions by Women’s Aid provided support as well as somewhere to go
- An opportunity for women to discuss their experiences with others and people who understood
– The commonly held belief that marriage was a private matter interfered with women’s ability to speak out
- Feared reactions from the local community and family members because sometimes, more often than not, they were unsupportive
– Themes of isolation and control visible in oral history
– Scottish Women’s Aid provided recognition and the ability to find communal support to dispel the notion of isolation
– Issues of internal conflict within women realizing they had been victims of domestic abuse; popular discourse caused this conflict before there was a voice for those women
- Could be inhibiting for women to seek help or question their situation
– 1970’s-80’s—attempts to leave were not socially acceptable
- Evidence profound practical and emotional implications of institutional responses to domestic violence
- SWA essential for victims of domestic abuse