Domestic Trauma: Textile Responses to Confinement, Coercion and Control

Abstract

One result of the public health quarantine measures resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic has been an increase in the incidence of domestic abuse against women. This practice-based interdisciplinary research paper considers the domestic trauma resulting from confinement, coercion and control within the home and textile responses to it. It aims to highlight these domestic concerns, challenge attitudes about coercive control and provoke discussion. Contemporary research into domestic abuse is combined with examples of domestic coercion and control described in literature and textile. Many women, both in life and literature, have used textiles as an alternative form of discourse to describe coercion and control in the home. As first-wave feminist Olive Schreiner shrewdly noted about women traumatized by domesticity “What has she but her needle?”. Textiles such as Elizabeth Parker’s sampler recording her domestic abuse are discussed, as well as contemporary responses by survivors and artists. As well as recording coercive control, textiles can also be used as an alternative form of discourse in the healing process. The paper ends on an encouraging note discussing textile initiatives that assist victims of domestic trauma.