Houghton, Rianne (2024). Reclaiming the domestic: exploring the significance of 'home' for women who have experienced domestic violence and abuse. University of Birmingham. Ph.D.
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Houghton2024PhD.pdf
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Abstract
Domestic violence and abuse (DVA) is a pervasive phenomenon that disproportionately affects women (ONS, 2021). While existing DVA research often addresses the physical, emotional, sexual, and financial manifestations of abuse experienced by women, as well as coercive control, the spatial realities of DVA are rarely explored in the same way.
It is argued that societal sexism enables and excuses domestic abuse (Women’s Aid, 2022), and as sociological and feminist explanations of the prevalence of DVA have developed, there has been a move towards making ‘public’ a problem that was once thought ‘private’. Although welcome, this shift in how we approach DVA – along with the rejection of traditional male-female, public-private binaries – has displaced debate about the relationship between women and the home.
This research argues the case for reclaiming the ‘domestic’ in DVA following an exploration of how home changes for victim-survivors of DVA, what the idea of home represents, and how re-building home can aid women in their recovery. Following 15 in-depth, qualitative interviews and the application of Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA), this research has found that there is a unique spatial quality to DVA; that DVA has spatial consequences that move with victim-survivors; that the home is an important site of reclamation for victim-survivors; and that feeling 'at home' matters in the context of DVA.
This research proposes that by recognising what the home symbolises to victim-survivors, a greater understanding of how DVA is experienced and how its long-term implications may manifest is available. This research also offers possible indicators of DVA in relation to space, as well as practical recommendations for agencies and organisations who re-house women, whether in permanent or emergency accommodation.
| Type of Work: | Thesis (Doctorates > Ph.D.) | |||||||||
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| Award Type: | Doctorates > Ph.D. | |||||||||
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| Licence: | Creative Commons: Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 | |||||||||
| College/Faculty: | Colleges > College of Social Sciences | |||||||||
| School or Department: | School of Social Policy | |||||||||
| Funders: | Other | |||||||||
| Other Funders: | University of Birmingham | |||||||||
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) H Social Sciences > HM Sociology H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman |
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| URI: | http://etheses.bham.ac.uk/id/eprint/14756 |
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