Suffering and affection: narratives about everyday women victims of domestic violence

Abstract

This project focuses on the narratives of suffering and affection of women who use the institutional assistance network for victims of domestic violence. The objectives of this project are: 1) to understand what the meanings given to suffering and affection in women's narratives, 2) to observe whether, and how, the experience of violence emerges or sheds light on them, 3) verify what relationships are called upon (whether family or not) and how they are imbricated in these narratives; 4) to observe whether, and how, the senses or moral values give intelligibility and ordering to the experience of violence and suffering; 5) distinguish agencies and strategies developed in conflictual relations as are expressed in these narratives. The hypothesis are that: 1) exploring narratives of suffering and affection can contribute to the discussion on violence as elaborated in feminist academic theory and public policy on the theme; 2) narratives of suffering are not necessarily triggered by experience of domestic violence, although are important for its apprehension. Instead, it is posited that they are motivated by relations of affection or moral aspects; 3) the experience of the violence does not necessarily produce a disruption in domestic relations and family, but is constitutive of them; 4) in the relationship between women and institutional agents, there is a politicization of suffering, which constitutes their demands and this is incorporated into the logic of care support services to women. To explore these hypotheses, ethnographic research will be carried out in two institutions to support women: the "Centro de Referência e Apoio à Mulher Operosa" (CEAMO) and the "Mulheres que Amam Demais - Campinas posso ajudar" (MADA - Campinas). If in the first it is the violence that seems to work as the main motivator of the narratives, in the second it is love that emerges as primary. Ethnographically engaging both spaces will allow for the reflexivel elucidation not only of the specificities of the narratives of suffering and affection but also of how the experience of domestic and family violence is made intelligible. In this sense, this research aims to show that love and suffering are important aspects of violent relationships, and should be included in the theories and policies addressing domestic violence. (AU)