Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Social Work Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 14 of 14

Full-Text Articles in Social Work

Ukrainian Women Refugees In Italy And Their Risk Of Sexual Violence: An Interview With Luisanna Porcu, Lepa Mladjenović Jan 2023

Ukrainian Women Refugees In Italy And Their Risk Of Sexual Violence: An Interview With Luisanna Porcu, Lepa Mladjenović

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


Children As Mischievous Spirits: Legitimizing Child Cruelty And Filicide In Contemporary Africa, Chima Agazue Jun 2021

Children As Mischievous Spirits: Legitimizing Child Cruelty And Filicide In Contemporary Africa, Chima Agazue

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

The belief that certain humans are spiritual entities and the belief that some people are spiritually possessed can be found across histories and cultures. While these individuals are not always viewed in the negative or treated inhumanely, cases abound whereby degrading and inhumane treatments are meted out to some of them. In the African continent, certain groups of people, particularly children are linked to certain mischievous spirits due to their unusual appearance, aberrant behavior, disability, chronic illness, psychopathology or exceptional ability. Some are also suspected and consequently mistreated due to events surrounding their birth. Such children are known by different …


A Mule For The Patriarchy: Waking Up To The Harm Of Prostitution To Wives And Families, Andrea Heinz Dec 2020

A Mule For The Patriarchy: Waking Up To The Harm Of Prostitution To Wives And Families, Andrea Heinz

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

I exited from commercial sexual exploitation eight years ago. Here, I share my reflections on how my actions directly impacted other women. I describe how my participation in the sex trade adversely affected the wives and girlfriends of sex buyers. I posit that sex sellers negatively impact these vicarious victims by subscribing to and endorsing “sex work” ideology. I assert that the collective good of all women is diminished by viewing sexual services as a market commodity. I stress that the collective good of all women is enhanced by assuming responsibility and compassion for one another.


Seeing The Shadow Women: The Hidden Victims Of Prostitution, Donna M. Hughes Dec 2020

Seeing The Shadow Women: The Hidden Victims Of Prostitution, Donna M. Hughes

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

A group of hidden victims of prostitution has been brought to light by Ingeborg Kraus, a trauma therapist in Germany, and Andrea Heinz, a woman with experience in the sex trade in Canada. Dignity has published four articles by these two writers in the last year. Their nascent body of work is uncovering important new information and perspectives on prostitution. Through their own experience and interviews with wives of sex buyers and women with sex trade experience they show us a more holistic view of the harm of prostitution. They write about the wives and families of men who are …


"My Head Was Like A Washing Machine On Spin": (Improving) Women’S Experiences Of Accessing Support, Jo Neale, Kathryn Hodges Dec 2020

"My Head Was Like A Washing Machine On Spin": (Improving) Women’S Experiences Of Accessing Support, Jo Neale, Kathryn Hodges

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

This paper draws on data collected as part of two larger studies to set out the differences, according to women seeking support, between the feminist responses of the specialist women’s sector and the issues-led responses of other agencies. The first study examined the processes by which women enter, endure, and exit relationships with abusive men. The second study explored the barriers to help-seeking for those accessing a service for women involved in prostitution. Taking a feminist poststructuralist approach, the authors point to the gendered nature, both of the experiences that propel women toward help-seeking and of the responses they receive …


Women Exiting Prostitution: Reports Of Coercive Control In Intimate Relationships, Tammy Schultz, Aimee A. Callender, Sally Schwer Canning, Jacey Collins Dec 2020

Women Exiting Prostitution: Reports Of Coercive Control In Intimate Relationships, Tammy Schultz, Aimee A. Callender, Sally Schwer Canning, Jacey Collins

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

There is burgeoning research on intimate partner violence (IPV) experiences among women globally. However, there is a dearth of research on IPV experiences among marginalized populations in Western countries. Over the past decade, IPV research has shifted from a focus only on physical and sexual violence to include coercive control experiences. These include a continuum of nonviolent behaviors centered on maintaining dominance over one’s partner. However, the empirical literature on examining coercive control among women in prostitution within non-commercial intimate partners is lacking. In this study, we analyzed interviews with 17 women exiting prostitution and examined reported IPV sexual, physical, …


On Exiting From Commercial Sexual Exploitation: Insights From Sex Trade Experienced Persons, Andrea Heinz Aug 2020

On Exiting From Commercial Sexual Exploitation: Insights From Sex Trade Experienced Persons, Andrea Heinz

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

As a woman who exited after seven years in licensed commercial sexual exploitation in Canada, I share my reflections on my experience, which led to the development of the Insights from Sex Trade Experienced Persons (InSTEP) Model. The model was constructed based on interviews with “service providers” in the sex trade. Twelve exited women share their experiences inclusively. InSTEP is geared toward a population of quasi-autonomous providers who have alternate economic options. Three levels are introduced in the InSTEP model to describe the continuum of agency among service providers; Level 1: trafficked/controlled; Level 2: quasi-autonomous; Level 3: autonomous. The InSTEP …


Loss Of Self In Dissociation In Prostitution; Recovery Of Self In Connection To Horses: A Survivor's Journey, Sandra Norak Feb 2020

Loss Of Self In Dissociation In Prostitution; Recovery Of Self In Connection To Horses: A Survivor's Journey, Sandra Norak

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

This narrative is about dissociation in the lives of women who have been exploited through prostitution. When we speak about prostitution, we do not speak often enough about the dissociation needed for women and girls to survive sexual exploitation. The author challenges the wisdom of governments such as Germany that legalize prostitution, treating it as a “job” and ignoring the violence and subsequent dissociation in women. The author describes her personal journey, explaining how women are traumatized even after the first commercial sex act, which is a sexual assault. They dissociate which makes their lives bearable, but they fail to …


Parents As Pimps: Survivor Accounts Of Trafficking Of Children In The United States, Jody Raphael Feb 2020

Parents As Pimps: Survivor Accounts Of Trafficking Of Children In The United States, Jody Raphael

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

This article discusses four survivor accounts of survivors of being sold for sexual exploitation by their parents for monetary gain. These narratives, supplemented by other accounts from 100 newspaper stories between 2012 and 2018, reveal the fact that many survivors were sold as very young children, and the abuse continued through their teen years, blurring distinctions between pedophilia and the sex trade industry. In their accounts, survivors described the motivations of their parents as well as the buyers, who used excessive force and violence. Some researchers are beginning to document the existence of parental pimping and its prevalence, which ranges …


Shadow Women: Wives Betrayed By Sex Buyers, Ingeborg Kraus Jan 2020

Shadow Women: Wives Betrayed By Sex Buyers, Ingeborg Kraus

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

Shadow women are women whose husbands betray them by using prostituted women. Until now, there has been almost no attention paid to the harm to the wives or partners of men who use prostituted women. In this interview, Dr. Ingeborg Kraus talks to the former wife of a sex buyer. She describes the impact of her husband’s betrayal on her and her family. This type of harm needs to be taken seriously and more research done on it.


Reaching And Supporting Trafficked Women In Austria And Germany: A Call For Training On Attachment And Trust-Building, Silke Gahleitner, Katharina Gerlich, Roschan Heiler, Heidemarie Hinterwallner, Edith Huber, Mascha Körner, Josef Pfaffenlehner, Yvette Völschow Apr 2019

Reaching And Supporting Trafficked Women In Austria And Germany: A Call For Training On Attachment And Trust-Building, Silke Gahleitner, Katharina Gerlich, Roschan Heiler, Heidemarie Hinterwallner, Edith Huber, Mascha Körner, Josef Pfaffenlehner, Yvette Völschow

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

Many victims of trafficking in women are not reached by the available support services despite numerous measures that have been put in place on both the national and international levels. This deficiency is due to the inadequacy of the support systems, which do not meet the needs of the women concerned. A bilateral Austro-German research project entitled “Prävention und Intervention bei Menschenhandel zum Zweck sexueller Ausbeutung (PRIMSA) [“Prevention and intervention in the trafficking of human beings for the purpose of sexual exploitation”] was set up with the aim of developing ideas for a multidisciplinary prevention and intervention scheme. This article …


When A Stone Is Not A Stone: Memories Of Clerical Abuse, Charles V. Sords Apr 2019

When A Stone Is Not A Stone: Memories Of Clerical Abuse, Charles V. Sords

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

From the fourth to the sixth grades, Charles V. Sords suffered traumatic sexual abuse by Catholic clergy. He suppressed these memories, yet the pain of what happened impacted every aspect of his life. As an adult, several strong, sensory experiences brought the truth of his childhood into focus. He confronted the Church—and the system that protected clerical criminals. This memoir is an account of childhood sexual abuse, the particularly shameful nature of being raped by priests, and how the Catholic Church’s method of handling this and similarly horrifying revelations has re-traumatized survivors.


Never Again! Surviving Liberalized Prostitution In Germany, Sandra Norak, Ingeborg Kraus Oct 2018

Never Again! Surviving Liberalized Prostitution In Germany, Sandra Norak, Ingeborg Kraus

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

This article, co-authored by a six-year survivor of the sex trade industry in Germany (Sandra Norak) and a psychologist and trauma therapist (Ingeborg Kraus), provides perspectives on the difficulty of withstanding the coercion of traffickers and the difficulties of exiting prostitution in a country in which prostitution has been legalized, normalized and made “a job like any other.” This normalization persuades survivors to believe their traffickers that it is a legitimate occupation and encourages them to endure the violence. Liberalization also has prevented the development of needed trauma services to those seeking to exit the sex trade industry.


From Victim To Healer: How Surviving Sex Trafficking Informs Therapeutic Practice, Emily M. Waters Nov 2016

From Victim To Healer: How Surviving Sex Trafficking Informs Therapeutic Practice, Emily M. Waters

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.