Abusive Marriage Research Articles

Henrietta Howard: mistress, survivor, imperialist?

ABSTRACT Traditionally, Henrietta Howard has been seen through the lens of her role as George II's mistress and a ‘woman of reason’ who was connected to the leading men of her day. More recently, Henrietta Howard has been reinterpreted as a minor feminist icon: a survivor, who overcame childhood tragedy, an abusive marriage, and the patriarchal system to become a leading cultural patron, living in comfort at the home she built, Marble Hill. This article seeks to situate Henrietta as a beneficiary of, and participant in, imperial activity and exchange. Today these two interpretations - Henrietta as ‘survivor’ and Henrietta as ‘imperialist’;- feel at odds with one another. Present-day attitudes mean that a feel-good, ‘girlboss’; feminist narrative about Henrietta’s life, does not sit easily with the fact that she benefitted from transatlantic slavery. However, I argue the two readings can be reconciled, creating a new interpretation, when we consider that it was through imperial activity that Georgian women such as Henrietta Howard were able to materially benefit, survive and even thrive.

Cultural dynamics of gender-based violence and pastoral care in South Africa

Gender-based violence is a prevalent issue that impacts most South Africans. The spread of sexual violence has created and atmosphere of intense fear in most homes. African cultural norms have helped to facilitate the continuation of discrimination against women. In African cultures, cases of abuse are often marginalised and considered an irrelevant reason for seeking a divorce. This has resulted in some women being forced to endure years of domestic abuse in their marriages, and they have even passed on this resilient mentality to more recent generations of married women. It is crucial to realise that the Recognition of Common Legislation Marriages Act, which is a part of South African legislation, acknowledges customs like polygamy and lobola. Lobola and polygamous marriages, among other practices, have been linked to major increases in the maltreatment of women, according to certain African researchers. In this particular study, the researcher aims to examine the impact of culturally induced gender-based violence (GBV) on pastoral care practices in South Africa, specifically focusing on the experiences and needs of South African women within abusive marriages. It is important to recognise that GBV is rooted in patriarchy, which promotes a culture of male power over women. In this research, qualitative methods will be employed to investigate how this unhealthy power dynamic encourages men to behave violently towards women.Contribution: This study delves into the intricate relationship between culturally induced GBV and pastoral care in South Africa. Focused on the surge in violence, it employs qualitative methods to explore women’s experiences, revealing the connection between violence and entrenched patriarchal structures. The research seeks to inform and enhance pastoral practices in addressing GBV.

Sahelis in struggle: Reimagining feminist solidarity and friendship in neoliberal times

1980s. The autonomous women's movement burst into the scene capturing the imagination of so many women – women who were trapped in families, women who were battling sexism in their workplace, women suffocating in abusive marriages, women struggling to be seen and heard in political organizations that still refused to see gender as a primary question - women from different backgrounds, professions, caste, class, religion, political beliefs – all of whom who were ill at ease with their worlds, their homes, their works and were struggling to find air, grappling for a new home, came together in solidarity, resistance, rage and imagination. While the rumblings of the women's movement, of feminist politics could be felt long back since the waging of the freedom struggle, there was a novelty in the way the 80s moment brought in scores of women to talk, scream, organize, sing, dance, shout slogans, march, ideate on things that moved them, on ‘women's issues’. The idea of sisterhood though soon encountered the anti-Mandal commission agitation, and the rise of Hindutva that exposed the cracks, faultlines of any notion of sisterhood that subsumed identities of caste, religion, sexuality. The journey of the feminist movement in India, therefore, has also been a journey of making and remaking of ideas of sisterhood, solidarity, of the collective ‘we’. While the critical interventions from identity based movements have torn down the inherent ‘naturalness’ of women's friendships – bringing to question the identities and political locations that make the collective ‘we’, the question arises, how do we then think of forging bonds of resilient comradeships, of waging collective struggles in times of cancel culture and neoliberal notions of ‘allyship’. Informed by and building on the debates on ‘intersectionality’ (Nivedita Mennon, Mary John, David Mcnally, etc.), learnings from identity based interventions in movements, and Marxist feminist interventions, this paper will examine Jodi Dean's theorization of the communicative ‘we’, Devika Jain's reconfiguration of Ambedkar's concept of ‘maitri’, and insights from activists in the struggle to unpack how we can think of building companionship of resistances in today's times. Furthermore, as we interrogate the possibilities of friendship in organizing social relations in the new world, we will also look into the possibilities it then holds in crafting a new morality, new ethics.

The evolving experiences and impacts of divorce for women living in Palestine: a mixed-method narrative analysis

ABSTRACT The impacts of divorce for Palestinian women are changing over time in important ways. Some women seek divorce to escape domestic abuse and restricted autonomy, but in previous generations many experienced social exclusion instead of understanding and support. We aimed to understand how divorce changes the lives and psychological wellbeing of contemporary Palestinian women, how intersecting identities might influence change, and to recommend areas of Palestinian research development for traditionally marginalized groups. A single-case narrative was developed from a translated transcript, and common themes were compared with quantitative data from a sample of 93 divorced women assessed with a survey designed by local clinicians. In the single-case narrative, divorce represented freedom from a ‘prison-like’ marriage and a chance for personal development. Half of the broader sample shared experiences of abusive marriages and most anticipated more freedom following divorce. We conclude that divorce in the context of a conflicted or abusive marriage can improve the lives of Palestinian women and provide opportunities for wellbeing and personal growth. However, post-divorce experience varies depending on age, family support, living situation and educational level. Enriched understanding in this area will require the development of methodologies relevant to the sociocultural and political context.

"What's Love Got to Do": Tracing Violence Against Post-Soviet Women in Cross-Border Marriages

Women in cross-border marriages are at a heightened risk of experiencing domestic violence, as they areparticularly traumatised by the experience of migration, which undermines their capacity for independentaction, and they are more vulnerable at the intersections of status, ethnicity, employment, and income. Usingthe theoretical framework of narrative victimology, in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted withfive women from post-Soviet countries (Ukraine and Belarus) who were married to Israeli Arab Muslims.This study examines the experience of victimisation and spousal abuse among Slavic Christian women fromthe FSU married to Arab Muslims in Israel. The narratives of the women confirmed that cross-border spousesare susceptible to domestic abuse and intimate partner violence. The constellation of a cross-border familycombines the external risk factors, such as the trauma of migration and the loss of socio-economic stability,the cultural factors associated with the patriarchal nature of Arab society and the tolerance of wife-beating,and the individual man's need to maintain control through the use of coercion and violence. Isolation, as anatural consequence of immigration and as a coercive technique used by an abuser, operates together,intensifying the experience of abuse and preventing the woman from reaching out for help. Pregnancy andchildbearing constituted a particular risk factor for perpetrating abuse against cross-border wives bydebilitating the woman and further preventing her from leaving the abusive marriage.

Knowledge and attitudes of antenatal mothers towards intimate partner violence in the Gambia: A cross-sectional study.

Intimate partner violence is a severe public health and human rights issue that 1 in 3 women experience in their lifetime. A woman's knowledge and attitudes towards intimate partner violence might influence her experience of violence from an intimate partner. This study aimed at analysing the knowledge and attitudes of antenatal mothers towards intimate partner violence. This study employed a descriptive cross-sectional technique. Pregnant women seeking antenatal care were selected from 6 public healthcare facilities in the Gambian Upper River Region (URR). We used the single proportion formula to calculate the sample size, which was 373 women. Data were entered, cleaned and analysed using SPSS version 21.Majority of the participants had good knowledge about IPV (77%). The most common intimate partner violence known to the women was denial of money to hurt her (80.2%). Only 58% of the women knew that a male partner's insistence on knowing their whereabouts at all times and expecting them to seek permission before accessing healthcare is a form of violence. Eighty-seven per centof the participants had a negative attitude towards IPV (i.e., they were not precisely against the stated forms of violence perpetrated by their partners). When asked about what would warrant them to leave their partners, 67% claimed they would never leave their partners despite facing violence. According to 36% of the respondents, women stay in abusive marriages because of their children.Despite the relatively high knowledge of pregnant women on IPV, their attitudes tell a different story, which is: acceptance of violent behaviours from their partners. More work needs to be done to sensitise women on their rights not to be violated and engage the whole society in changing the social norms unfavourable to them.

“The Gender Dimension of Abusive Marriage Relationships in the Modern Zimbabwe” Insights from Harare

“The Gender Dimension of Abusive Marriage Relationships in the Modern Zimbabwe” Insights from Harare

Why do they decide to stay? Experience of Indian women surviving intimate partner violence

PurposeIntimate partner violence (IPV) is a prevalent public health issue impacting women’s physical and mental health and psychosocial walks of life across cultures and societies. Despite this, many women continue to stay in such relationships. This study aims to examine, from a constructionist perspective, why women stay in abusive marriages and what factors prevent them from taking appropriate actions. Also, women’s experiences of surviving IPV were explored.Design/methodology/approachUsing a descriptive qualitative research method, the authors recruited and interviewed 17 women from northern India. The data were analysed thematically.FindingsThe underlying themes that emerged in response to the research questions were the lack of family support, societal ideals, the culture of normalizing violence, fear, love and hope and emotional turmoil. The reason for women not to leave abusive marriages corresponds to the broader social constructions of marriage and women’s perceived positions in family and society.Originality/valueResearch on women’s decision to stay in abusive relationships is limited, especially from the Global South. This study generates fresh evidence on the subject matter, specifically from the Indian context. The study result contributes uniquely by approaching the problem of staying in an abusive relationship from a social constructionist perspective. This study has implications for policy and psychosocial interventions to bring progressive changes in the lives of women experiencing IPV.

Buried alive in the dungeon

Abstract The church is still an unsafe terrain that breeds patriarchal ideologies. These ideologies are entrenched through religion and culture, sanctioned within the institution of marriage. In conversation with Denise Ackermann and Mercy Oduyoye’s West African Women Theology as a theoretical lens, this article amplifies the voices of African women in the context of the Anglican Church of South Africa (ACSA) on their lived experiences of GBV. This essay seeks to establish the life-denying theologies or acts of faith within ACSA that encourage married women to stay in abusive marriages. Data used in this paper emerged from the semi-structured interviews collected between January 2021 and July 2021 from the Diocese of Natal. Data revealed that teachings on male headship, silence and forgiveness and marriage and divorce play a role in the abuse. Unmasking toxic theologies is fundamental for interventions to be relevant.

Moral Assessment of Violations of Marital Vows Among Christian Couples In Urhoboland

The majority of people, especially among the Urhobo, seem to view marriage as their final resort when it comes to getting over issues like loneliness, sexual tension, and social, cultural, economic, and political constraints. However, marriages built on these flimsy foundations frequently end in a string of breakdowns when faced with difficulties, which results in the breaking of marital vows. Due to the above, this work examines the morality of Christian couples in Urhoboland, Delta State, and Nigeria who break their marital vows. The inquiry made use of both analytical and phenomenological approaches. This work was evaluated using a systematic questionnaire and unstructured oral interviews. As a result, 12 churches in six local government areas were selected (Ethiopia East, Ethiopia West, Udu, Ughelli North, Ughelli South, and Sapele Local Government Areas). The phenomenological and analytical procedures were used due to the versatility of survey designs, which allow for a wide range of data collection techniques. The investigation in this work was done under two headings: factors responsible for violations of marriage vows and effects of marriage vow violations on couples, families, and society. This study shows a number of elements that contribute to marital vow breaches as well as the repercussions such violations have on individuals, families, and society. The participants agree that, in general, Christian married couples who divorce have a sense of autonomy and freedom from abusive marriages. This essay contends that since they broke their marital vows, both partners frequently experience severe spiritual regression.

Calvin and Covenant Marriage: A Critical Genealogy

Many Christians treat marriage as a covenant. An influential group of contemporary Christians argues that covenant marriage provides a response to what they regard as the social ills of high divorce rates and the ‘breakdown’ of the traditional family. These Christians often look to John Calvin's marriage theology for inspiration because he linked treating marriage as a covenant to regarding marriage as sacred and indissoluble. In this article I cast doubt on the wisdom of treating marriage as a covenant. I develop a critical genealogy that shows Calvin's marriage theology oppressed women by reinforcing their subordination to men and trapping women in abusive marriages. I then argue that recent social science suggests covenant marriage functions similarly among contemporary Christians. I consider whether a non-oppressive form of covenant marriage can be developed, before suggesting that we cannot yet know whether covenant marriage is salvageable.

The ‘Post-Truth’ of Toxic Masculinity in Leftist Circles: Reading Meena Kandasamy’s When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife

Meena Kandasmy’s When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife narrates the story of a wife trapped in an abusive marriage where her abuse is meted out and sustained through a structure of manipulative tactics which her abuser claims as nothing but “leftist truths”. This immaculate description of toxic masculinity and violence upheld by flawed yet historically founded absorptions of leftist political ideals begs the need for a deeper enquiry into how the left conserves toxic masculinity. This paper is a further analysis of the novel with respect to understanding the ways communist and socialist ideologies (or what can broadly be termed as the left in popular political vocabulary) defend and reproduce hegemonic notions of masculinity while at the same time denying its effects or existences. This is also an enquiry into the possibilities how the left has in many ways believed in what can be understood as a post-truth that it is inherently resistant of patriarchy, while upholding it.

The Principle and Practice of Mahr in Muslim Marriages

Muslim marriages are essentially a contract entered into by two consenting adults. It emphasizes the need to lay down the terms of the contract and also ensures financial safeguards to women getting married. The financial safeguards are provided through provision of Mahr – a payment made or committed by the groom towards the bride at the time of Nikah. This article examines the practice of giving and taking Mahr. The findings of the study suggest a huge difference between the actual prescribed way and the practised way of giving Mahr. Due to lack of awareness among women about their rights and the social and cultural practices dominating the practice, Mahr, instead of being a safeguard, becomes a source of bondage into abusive marriages for women.

Love and Duty: Confederate Widows and the Emotional Politics of Loss by Angela Esco Elder

Reviewed by: Love and Duty: Confederate Widows and the Emotional Politics of Loss by Angela Esco Elder Libra R. Hilde (bio) Love and Duty: Confederate Widows and the Emotional Politics of Loss. By Angela Esco Elder. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2022. Pp. 224. $95.00 cloth; $27.95 paper; $21.99 ebook) The Civil War created 200,000 Confederate widows. Angela Esco Elder uses personal narratives, print, and popular-culture sources to explore the social vision and expectations of widows, their heightened political clout, and their diverse responses to loss. "Because society invested widowhood with so much significance, it inadvertently created the stage upon which an unforeseen and unprecedented number of young Confederate women could be seen and heard," Elder writes (p. 2). While Elder includes working-class women, the sources favor elite white women. Love and Duty traces the emotional contours of widow's lives and the political significance of their mourning rituals, which took on increased salience as leaders sought legitimacy for the Confederacy. Widows had a public role to play, and they expected reciprocal rewards. The staggering level of male death in a highly patriarchal society makes this an important study. As wives became widows, they displayed a range of reactions, with some upholding social ideals and others falling short. A selfless widow wore proper mourning attire, found refuge in motherhood and religion, and devoted herself to her husband's memory and to the Confederacy. Widows' behavior mattered, and they "became walking embodiments of sacrifice for their communities" (p. 81). Elder probes the variety of lived experience as these women navigated financial, material, and emotional distress. She interweaves moving individual narratives throughout the book. Chapter two contains an especially strong section on written intimacy as letters became increasingly important and unguarded amidst prolonged separations. This book poses intriguing questions, though Elder's answers sometimes remain unsubstantiated. Elder notes that some wives in abusive marriages likely felt relief when a husband died but [End Page 82] provides no evidence to back up this statement. In addition, the historiography is incomplete. Elder cites Confederate Reckoning (2010) but should explicitly note that she is building on Stephanie McCurry's argument about the unintended ramifications of symbolically including women in the framing of the Confederate experiment. Contrary to Elder's claim, historians have not portrayed southern women as a monolith. She shows tensions within families and across generations, but misses the opportunity to fully address the historiography on class divides and shifting gender roles even as the patriarchy survived. As they reconstructed their lives, widows wielded their social capital to petition the government for aid. Widows who visibly endorsed the Confederacy were more successful, meaning that those in the border states faced added hardships. Because they had "political power," mounting deaths amplified concern over the "sexually promiscuous widow" (pp. 107, 103). Most of the lengthy examples present model widows or those who grieved too deeply rather than in a politically problematic way. The book would benefit from extended first-person stories of those who upended expectations. In the postwar period, widows continued to invoke their special status to seek support. Elite widows could become celebrities devoted to memorializing their deceased husbands. However, Elder suggests that many impoverished widows had little time or energy for memorial work. Those most active in memorial associations were married or widowed after the war, and thus Elder contends that "white women did not seamlessly work together to create a Lost Cause ideology" (p. 132). She raises astute questions about widows' anemic participation, but the evidence is thin. Moreover, not working for something is not the same as working against it. Did these women speak out against the Lost Cause, even privately? Once again, the detailed stories highlight publicly active widows. If "grief, and grieving rituals, could be simultaneously compliant and oppositional," Elder needs examples of oppositional behavior from real women and [End Page 83] not just the fictional Scarlett O'Hara. Was this open opposition or an inability or refusal to actively engage? Libra R. Hilde LIBRA R. HILDE teaches history at San José State University. She is the author of Worth a Dozen Men: Women and Nursing in the Civil War South...

Emotional abuse among married women at Vhembe district: Experiences and consequences.

Emotional abuse is seen as an issue to be kept secret and not reported, because there is no evidence of abuse until stress, sickness and death occur. The study aimed at exploring the experiences and consequences of emotional abuse among married women in a selected village in the Vhembe district in Limpopo province. Vhembe district in Limpopo province. This qualitative study adopted a descriptive phenomenological design. Participants were selected using purposive sampling, with the support of the local healthcare professional to select participants with lived experiences around emotional abuse. In-depth one-on-one unstructured interviews were conducted. Only ten married women were interviewed because of data saturation. Colaizzi's method was used to analyse the data. The results revealed three themes - the participants' experiences of emotional abuse, the impacts of emotional abuse on the victim and reasons for remaining in an abusive marriage - and eight sub-themes. Married women also stated several reasons for remaining in abusive marriages such as poverty and love for the spouse. The study showed a lack of understanding and consequences of emotional abuse among married women in a village in Limpopo province. The cultural institutions that support lobola disempower women, reinforce violence and allow husbands to have power over their wives. The participants thought men had every right to do whatever they liked with them because they paid their bridal price (lobola). Hence, it is essential to increase the understanding of emotional abuse among women by educating them on various platforms regarding their rights. This study contributes to understanding the lived experiences of emotional abuse and its consequences on married women.

“People just Didn’t Respect Women who Were not Married”: Revisiting the Question of why Abused Wives Stay in Marriage in Reneilwe Malatji’s Short Story “Love Interrupted”

This article is an African feminist analysis of the short story “Love Interrupted” by South African writer Reneilwe Malatji in terms of how it deepens our understanding of why abused wives stay in marriage. Drawing on African cultural conceptions of marriage, motherhood and family relationships—as elucidated in African feminisms—the analysis unravels several reasons why women stay in marriage despite persistent abuse: 1) they stay to meet cultural expectations of a good wife; 2) they stay because of feelings of indebtedness to husbands who married them at great cost; 3) they perceive marriage as the sole means of accessing and maintaining respectability in society; and 4) they stay out of a sense of responsibility towards children born to perpetuate the patrilineal line. Malatji’s story shows that these reasons do not exist in isolation of each other but rather inform and reinforce each other. Thus, this article argues that the intricate connectedness of these reasons illustrates the ubiquity of cultural gender roles, values and beliefs in compelling women to manage abusive marriages rather than end them.

Navigating citizenship and motherhood in and beyond Berlin

ABSTRACT This article centres on the predicaments of an East African migrant woman who resided in an Eastern EU country and is the mother of a child holding citizenship in the same EU country. Seeking asylum in Germany after having fled an abusive marriage, she found out that her residency in an EU country would most likely invalidate her asylum claim. Being classified as an EU migrant and withdrawing her asylum application, however, complicated her and her daughter’s access to welfare provision. Tracing this woman’s struggles in Germany and her onward migration trajectory to a country in the Arab world, offers a perspective on the consequences of legal complexity, challenging bureaucratic encounters, and missing support structures for a mother’s relationship with her daughter. Her negotiations of dominant parenting ideologies, attempts to create belonging, and striving to cope with racialization in the process of migration to and attempting to settle in Germany can be read as navigations of citizenship.

Women Seeking Divorce in India: Multiaxial Analysis of a Traumatic Process

This paper attempts to critically analyse the lived experience of women seeking divorce in India. A theoretical framework of knowledge is laid out by examining the familial, social, financial, legal and mental health factors that are relevant to a woman’s marital experience and the decision to stay or leave an abusive marriage. Empirical data has been reviewed to provide preliminary support to such theoretical claims. Thereafter, the paper adopts a single case study approach to converge such a theoretical framework with the lived experience of a woman seeking divorce in India, to expose an all-encompassing understanding of the intersection of gender, marriage and divorce in India. The study has revealed several hypotheses that warrant critical examination and empirical studies.

Mourning the Mamalith: A Graphic Response to Grief

“I  love  you  so  much,”  are  the  last  words  I  said  to  my  mother  on  the  telephone  on  Valentine’s  Day,  just  a  few  days  before  she  died.  Our  love  was  as  complicated  as  it  was  deep.  My  mother’s  dogmatic  fundamentalism left little room for me, her queer only child. I have spent a lifetime unravelling a brutal family  history  that  caused  her  to  cling  to  religion,  to  love  Jesus  above  all  else,  including  family.  My  mother was born in Germany in 1938, violently displaced during partitioning in 1946, then abandoned in an orphanage for several years. Years later, she fled to the United States with me to escape an abusive marriage. My mother’s life and her death have prompted this graphic research. How can one develop a resilient sense of self and belonging despite traumatic origins? Is it possible to inhabit a new place and to make it one’s home without, however inadvertently, causing oppression and grief for those already living there? This piece serves as the Prologue to the graphic novel Queen of Snails: A Graphic Memoir (forthcoming November 2022), where I examine this tangled history in depth.

Torn Between the Real Me and the Social Me: Educated Women’s Perspectives of Surviving Marital Abuse

The perspectives of educated women on surviving abusive marital relationships have not been adequately explored, thus implying a gap in the literature regarding the role of education in enhancing or mitigating the prevalence of intimate partner violence (IPV). In this context, the question is how do educated women perceive surviving abusive relationships? Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA), using flexible semi-structured face-to-face interviews, was conducted to understand the experiences of eight highly educated women (master’s, Ph.D.) in abusive marriage. Four superordinate interrelated themes were developed: (a) developing an awareness of self-respect generating role confusion, (b) being torn between traditions and ambitions, (c) normalizing abuse as part of marriage, and (d) challenging abuse by self-promotion. Like other survivors of abuse, educated women tried to justify, blame themselves, work harder to please the perpetrator, and promote themselves; finally, they continued to live their lives by embracing abuse to bring peace and save their marriage. The effect of sociocultural context on educated women’s perspectives seems to play a crucial role in women’s decisions to stay in abusive relationships, despite the assumptions of empowerment and independence.