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b a Department of Sociology , University at Albany , Albany, New York, USA b 1064 Sonoma Avenue, Menlo Park, California, 94025, USA E-mail: Published online: 30 Jul 2010. To cite this article: Dawn McCaffrey (1998) Victim feminism/victim activism, Sociological Spectrum: Mid-South Sociological Association, 18:3, 263-284, DOI: 10.1080/02732173.1998.9982198 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02732173.1998.9982198 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the Content) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content. This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and- conditions D o w n l o a d e d
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VICTIM FEMINISM/VICTIM ACTIVISM DAWN MCCAFFREY Department of Sociology, University at Albany, University at Albany, Albany, New York, USA Scholars and critics from diverse fields have forwarded various argu- ments about the nature and representation of victimhood and victims. For the critics and scholars, victimhood is constructed as a state of powerlessness. Although constructionist arguments recognize an ideol- ogy undergirding victim constructions, they do not explicitly engage with postmodern debates on the workings of disciplinary power. Data from 20 in-depth interviews with women who have experienced sexual abuse or sexual assault suggest that they view themselves as survivors, a construction defined against dominant representations of victims. A postmodern view on power is applied to illuminate dynamics of the debate around victimhood and identity. Sexual violence toward women and subsequent claims of vic- timhood have emerged as contested sites not only among aca- demics, but also among social commentators. With the rise of victimology as a discipline, attention has been devoted to mapping the features of victimhood. Social constructionists and symbolic interactionists have framed "victimhood" as a dynamic process (Quinney 1972; Holstein and Miller 1990) with an under- lying ideology (Best 1997). At the same time, various com- mentators and theoreticians, some from feminist camps, have also been part of the dialogue on sexual victimhood. The critical commentators cast the anti-sexual violence movement as mired in a self-congratulatory victim culture, where victim-activists Received 15 July 1997; accepted 15 December 1997. An earlier version of this article was presented at the meetings of the American Sociological Association in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 1997. This research has been supported by a grant from Initiatives for Women, State University of New York, University at Albany. I wish to thank Linda Nicholson, Nelson Pichardo, Melinda Miceli, Joanne Reger, Jackie Eller, and two anonymous reviewers for their very helpful feedback on earlier versions of this article. I also gratefully acknowledge the courageous women who shared with me their stories of sexual violence. Address correspondence to: Dawn McCaffrey, 1064 Sonoma Avenue, Menlo Park, California 94025, USA. E-mail: DMccaffrey@aol.com Sociological Spectrum, 18:263-284,1998 Copyright 1998 Taylor & Francis 0273-2173/98 $12.00 +.00 263 D o w n l o a d e d
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264 D. McCaffrey construct an identity based on powerlessness. 1 Although this debate has garnered much attention in the popular press (Lachner 1993; Pollitt 1993), a shortcoming of the cited com- mentators is the lack of solid empirical support. In essence, the critics rely on observation and anecdotal evidence in formulat- ing their critiques. Although victimologists and social critics have illuminated some important contours of victimization, postmodern develop- ments around power attend to aspects of victimhood that have been neglected in previous work. In particular, postmodern accounts of power attend to the power embedded in discourse and the power enacted through the production of identities. Following a review of current literature, data from in-depth interviews with 20 female sexual violence victim-activists are presented. A postmodern view of power is used to highlight the shortcomings of constructionist and critical accounts of victim- hood. Suggestions for further research are offered in the con- cluding sections of this article. CONSTRUCTIONS OF VICTIMHOOD With the inauguration of victimology as a discipline, con- structionists and interactionists have made inroads into mapping the contours of victimhood. Breaking from positivist tradition, constructionists and interactionists view victimhood not as an unproblematic and objective reality state, but rather as an inter- actional accomplishment subject to contextual contingencies (Holstein and Miller 1990; Quinney 1972). In addition to prob- lematizing the putative objectivity of victimhood, construc- tionists and interactionists have argued that the process of assigning victim status not only serves a descriptive function, but also forwards implicit instruction on how to view the victims and their particular social milieu (Holstein and Miller 1990). For Holstein and Miller, designating an individual or group as victim calls forward particular blame attributions and organizes "proper" responses such as sympathy or righteous indignation. Similarly, Best (1997) argued that processes attendant in the construction of victims include a simultaneous designation of 1 Not only have social critics presented female victims of gender-based crimes as weak and powerless, legal scholars have argued that legal doctrine uses victim powerlessness as a standard for adjudicating the guilt or innocence of women charged with attacking their abusers (see Mahoney 1991, 1994). D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 265 perpetrator with absolution of victim responsibility (Best 1997). Moreover, Best contended that victimization claims carry an imperative against challenging victim status. That is, under the ideology of victimization there exists a shared understanding that the claims to victim status must always be respected, never disputed. 2 Although Best contended that victims of sexual viol- ence are "protected by sympathetic laws" and that there exists both an "ideological prohibition against challenging victims' claims" (p. 16) he provided no evidence for these claims. 3 By contrast, many researchers (Goodman, Koss, and Russo 1993; Janoff-Bulman 1992; Fairstein 1993; see also Alcoff and Gray 1993) have singled out female rape victims as a group that receives an inordinate amount of victim blaming, perpetuated by cultural myths. A second important feature of victimization is that it is conse- quential. Not only do victimizing experiences spawn long-term, often negative consequences (Best 1997), but a by-product of victimization is a totalizing designation of the victim as helpless or incompetent (Holstein and Miller 1990). To a certain degree, "'victimizing' a person 'dis-ables' that person to the extent that victim status appropriates one's personal identity as a com- petent efficacious actor" (P. 119). Victim status may become the lens through which others comprehend the victim's behavior. Third, under an ideology of victimization, the label of victim carries undesirable connotations (Best 1997), including implica- tions of powerlessness and passivity. In short, the construction of victimhood is argued to entail a deflection of responsibility by the victim (Holstein and Miller 1990), as well as creating negative long-term consequences for the victim. Moreover, the victim title is positioned as negative. 2 Best (1997) seemed to suggest that because victim status is putatively a protected status, it may be something that people seek. Others have suggested that because being identified as a victim (by oneself and others) is aversive, victims seek strategies for minimizing their victim- ization (Janoff-Bulman 1992; Kelly 1988; Herman 1992; Frankl 1963). 3 If it is currently unacceptable to challenge victim claims, as Best (1997) contended, it is the result of rape law reform efforts, which have only reached fruition in the past 25 years. Before 1974, legal proof of rape required corroboration by a third party, the reading of cautionary instructions to a jury that rape is a charge that is easy to make and difficult to prove, and, in states like New York, evidence of utmost resistance by the victim (making rape the only crime in which the victim was required to be injured twice; see Spohn and Horney 1992; Estrich 1986). With rape, victim-blaming has been historically structured into the law. Best's assertion that victim status confers exculpation for blame is unfounded in the case of sexual violence. D o w n l o a d e d
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266 D. McCaffrey As such, the victim discourse is posited as the "public articu- lation of injury and innocence" (P. 105). Although these scholars have sought to flesh out the features of the ideology of victim- ization, "victimhood" remains a contested category. THE DEBATE OVER VICTIM FEMINISM In the past several years, critics from diverse fields have emerged to contest a move in feminism toward what they call victim feminism. Although the critiques of victim feminism embody a range of issues, including feminist philosophy, strat- egy, and political agenda, much of the discourse around victim feminism has to do with the criticism of the feminist anti- violence movement and representations of victimhood (Wolf 1993; Roiphe 1993; Paglia 1994; hooks 1984; Morgenson 1992; Leo 1992; Hughes 1992; see also Best 1997). Perhaps the two most vociferous opponents of victim femi- nism are Katie Roiphe (1993) and Camille Paglia (1994). Both have depicted claims of rape as a device for pampered White college students to get attention, feel "oppressed" or valued. If the goal of anti-sexual violence activities like Take Back the Night 4 is to empower and bolster the self-esteem of women victims, these activities are said to be counterproductive (Roiphe 1993). Instead of empowering women, protest activities such as Take Back the Night reinforce women's vulnerability by celebrating their vic- timhood. And the celebration of victimhood cannot lead to strength. Paglia and Roiphe objected to the preoccupation of victim feminism with feelings of victimhood and oppression, arguing that the women who promote victim feminism are not only legally free and protected by the law but are among the most privileged women in the United States. Another commentator whose work has been central in the victim feminism discussion is Naomi Wolf. The major drawback of victim feminism, for Wolf (1993), is the structuring of one's identity around victimhood. For Wolf, the feminist antiviolence 4 Take Back the Night began in Europe in the early 1970s and has since been adopted as an annual protest activity in thousands of U.S. communities. Though each Take Back the Night may differ, most are characterized by speakouts against sexual violence, as well a nighttime march signifying the impingement of the threat of assault on women's physical mobility (hence partici- pants are "taking back the night" that has been taken from them). An important component to many Take Back the Night rallies is testimonials from people who have been sexually victimized. D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 267 movement is ensconced in a culture of self-abnegation, fixated on suffering, while having jettisoned earlier patterns in women's movements of celebrating or encouraging women's success. In Wolf's account of victim feminist culture, victimhood is central to identity, but feeling strong and capable is discouraged. But it is through this identity of victimhood that victims in the move- ment claim power. Similar to Wolf (1993), bell hooks (1994) decried bonding around victimhood as the cement holding the (White) feminist antiviolence movement together. Yet, in contrast to Wolf, who viewed the structuring of identity around victimhood as prob- lematic insofar as it prevents positive action in the movement, hooks detected a camouflaged agenda designed to maintain White supremacy. In adopting victim as identity, White femi- nists in the antiviolence movement conceal a strategy to main- tain the image that, because they have been sexually assaulted by men, they are beyond reproach in any domain. In other words, in privileging male violence toward women as a site of analysis, anti-sexual violence feminists effectively evade the issue of women as oppressors and abusers. Moreover, hooks (1984), like other critics, noted that it is the most privileged women who seem to most readily embrace victim identities. Ironically, the ability to claim victimhood as identity is a function of a privileged structural location: "Women who are exploited and oppressed daily cannot afford to relinquish the belief that they exercise some measure of control, however relative, over their lives" (hooks 1984:45). For hooks, victim-as-identity is suspect, for it is not a viable option for nonprivileged women. 5 "Seek[ing] power through an identity of powerlessness" (Wolf 1993:135) is at the heart of the problem of victim feminism for these critics. These critics then challenge the legitimacy of the powerless victim, because, they argue, as educated and often class-privileged women, these "victims" are in the best position to exercise political and social power. By glamorizing victim- hood, highlighting one's victim status, and consequently casting women as perpetually weak, the critics have argued that victim feminist activities like Take Back the Night are disempowering 5 Extrapolated, hooks's (1984) comments can partially account for the underrepresentation of women of color and poorer women in the feminist antiviolence movement. If women who are exploited and oppressed by race and/or class resist internalizing victim status, a movement that is purportedly predicted on the bonding of women as victims may hold little appeal. D o w n l o a d e d
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268 D. McCaffrey and counterproductive for women. It is notable that hooks (1984) alone provided a developed account of the racial and class politics undergirding many aspects of the feminist anti- sexual violence movement. Claims forwarded by constructionists and critics of victim feminism provide accounts of victimhood and victim identity. However, theoretical debates around power also illuminate this issue and attend to aspects of victimhood that are neglected by constructionists and critics of victim feminism. POWER At the same time that constructionists and critics have raised concerns about representations of power in victimhood, post- modern theorists have broken new ground in analyzing the workings of power (Foucault 1973, 1978, 1979, 1980; Butler 1990; see also Wartenberg 1991, 1992; Sawicki 1991; Seidman 1994). In his genealogies of scientific discourses and various social insti- tutions, Foucault's work has inaugurated a new dimension to conceptualizations of the workings of power. Put most simply, for Foucault, power is that which produces as well as negates. Foucault (1973, 1978, 1979, 1980) broke from traditional con- ceptualizations of power, dubbed a juridical or juridico- discursive model of power, by attending to the operation of power relationships at the micro level of society. 6 Under a juridical model, power is assumed to be possessed by individuals or groups of people. By extension, power is exercised as repress- ion, or "power against," according to a juridical framing of power. Instead of viewing power as a thing to be possessed, Foucault contended that power is exercised. And power, for Foucault, is not so much exercised in the service of repression, but rather when power is exercised, it is productive. Specifically, Foucault and other postmodernists attend to the productive power of discourse in the constitution of subjects and identities. As human subjectivity is constituted through discourse, social actors are never apart from power or domination. For Foucault (1973, 1978, 1979, 1980), social domination is enacted through 6 In crafting competing versions of power and its operations, postmodern theorists generally do not deny that the traditional model of power expresses one form that power may take. Rather, they seek to expand our understanding of the ways in which power is exercised and produced, particularly through discourse. D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 269 discourse and knowledge. Power simultaneously constitutes and represses such that "the same processes that form the individual as a 'subject' of consciousness also form that individual as 'sub- jected' to power" (Wartenberg 1991:159). Power permeates all social relationships by constituting human beings. As such, power is not merely a possession of the powerful. In arguing against a static view of social power, Foucault's (1978, 1979, 1980) theorizing on power moves beyond a simplis- tic equation of power with overt repression. In modern society, disciplinary power is fluid and is used to create social divisions between, for instance, the sane and the mad and between the noncriminal and the criminal. Power is used to create discourses through which human beings become subjects. The production of various subjects then legitimates the intervention by "experts" with authoritative knowledge. Social control is enacted through experts' efforts at normalizing various subjects (i.e., criminals, sexual deviants). Yet, within the context of disciplinary domination, there is agency. For Foucault 1980, resistance accompanies power. Resistance is equated with altering the terrain of power, with subjects reconstituting themselves and by extension reconstitut- ing power relations. Thus, the power to produce subjects and reconfigure subjectivities harbors a transformative potential in its ability to reconstitute rather than merely reproduce human beings and social relations. Postmodern sketches of power are useful in examining the debate around victim feminism and victim activism. Because postmodern views on power attend to the power inherent in language and discourse, this model can be used to flesh out the intricacies of the debate. Although competing representations of victimhood are forwarded by the critics of victim feminism and by the women interviewed for this study, both rely on juridical notions of power, where power is possessed and used to domi- nate. The critics examined here raise some interesting questions that can be addressed empirically. For example, for movement participants who have been sexually victimized, is "victim of violence" a salient and central aspect of their identity? Does participation in the feminist antiviolence movement lead women to feel more like victims? What benefits do victim- activists gain from their participation? What are their motiva- tions for participation? Additionally, what previously neglected D o w n l o a d e d
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270 D. McCaffrey aspects of power are evident in alternate constructions of "vic- timhood" or activism? METHODS Data were drawn from 20 semistructured interviews with women who have been sexually abused or assaulted and who are also anti-sexual violence activists. Women were recruited for participation in this study through several paths. Most women responded to my requests for participants that were posted on sexual-violence-related web sites or through flyers posted in the community where I live. Other women were recruited through my social networks or through snowball sam- pling. The racial/ethnic makeup of the sample was predomi- nantly White, though African American women and Latinas were represented. 7 The age of the sample ranged from late teens to mid-50s. Educationally, 3 of the women were high school graduates, 4 were either college students or had attend- ed college at some point, 6 held a bachelor's degree, and 7 were working toward advanced degrees. Interview topics explored the effects of sexual violence on the women's lives and how they perceived themselves in terms of their experiences with sexual violence. In addition, participants were asked to describe their history of antiviolence activism, as well as their motivation for activism and the meanings they assigned to it. The majority of the sample has been involved in organizing and speaking at Take Back the Night events. Other women were involved in organizations that addressed the particular type of assault or abuse they experienced, from date rape to abuse by educators, therapists, or family members. A few women in the sample were active with rape crisis programs in their com- munities. Through their involvement in organizations, the women in the sample had spoken publicly about their experi- ences. Thus, activists were involved in activities ranging from public speaking to publishing newsletters, to running their own 7 That the sample for this study consisted largely of White women offers some support for hooks's (1984) contention that a movement organized around sexual victimization where experi- ences of violence become central to one's identity may resonate more with White women than with women of color. It may also reflect the tendency of Whites to respond to requests for participation in social science research. D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 271 sexual-violence-related organizations, to answering rape crisis hotlines, to reforming legislation. Although the alarm over victim feminism and victim-as-iden- tity has received much attention, the critics' theoretical con- structions of victim identity have lacked empirical grounding in accounts of identity. As a result, critical representations fail to capture the complexity and nuance behind the identities of women who have been sexually victimized. Data presented here inform the debate. DE FACTO SURVIVOR VERSUS SURVIVOR AS AN EARNED STATUS In examining the victim feminism controversy, an issue nearly overlooked entirely by the critics is the distinction between victim and survivor made by many women who have experi- enced sexual violence. Almost exclusively, the women in the sample identified themselves as survivors, but they forwarded varying conceptualizations of this identifier. For a portion of the sample, survivorship entailed emerging from the event alive. Further, under this conceptualization, living through the abuse or assault conveyed inherent strength and skill, qualities attributed to the survivor regardless of her sub- sequent behavior. In response to the question "What does 'sur- vivor' mean for you?" one woman stated, "If you're walking, talking, and breathing, I think that's damn good." Other women echoed similar sentiments. A woman in her 30s who experi- enced a physically violent attempted rape stated, I'm a survivor. You're a victim if you die, if you don't make it out. . . . But, if you're around it means you did exactly what was the right thing to do. If you're ever around to think about it and talk about it and live with the memory, you're a survivor. Whereas one conceptualization of survivor ascribes that status to any woman who has experienced sexual violence and is alive to talk about it, other women viewed survivor as an earned status. For them, survivor status is achieved when one 8 Two women were ambivalent about claiming the status of survivor for themselves because they reserved that distinction for women who had been abused or assaulted in a physically violent way. Thus, the preferred identifier for these two women included neither victim nor survivor. Instead, "I was raped" and "I was sexually abused as a child" were the identifiers that these women used. D o w n l o a d e d
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272 D. McCaffrey discontinues an established pattern of unhealthy behavior, including self-blame. One woman who had endured years of childhood sexual abuse commented, "I see the role as a victim as allowing it to happen, allowing the pattern to go on and on and on. And as a survivor... I can choose to stop that. I don't have to stay there. I don't have to continue." For other women, shedding the victim role and taking on the status of survivor not only entailed the woman's taking steps to become more assert- ive, particularly in relationship choices, but also required her to discontinue self-blame and shame. For one woman in her 50s who had experienced multiple forms of abuse and assault throughout childhood and adulthood, You're a victim if you . . . blame yourself in any way, shape or form . . . [because] the perpetrator is 100% wrong. . . . A sur- vivor is kind of on top of the situation. And, I'm not there yet, but I've got one foot in the survivor kind of realm, where I'm not being abused, not opening myself up to any kind of relationship or any kind of abuse. Under the survivor-as-eamed-status configuration, each woman decides for herself whether and when she becomes a survivor. A woman can continue to be a victim long after the abuse or assault ends. From this vantage point, victims are those who blame themselves, carry shame, or continue to let others victim- ize them. None of the women interviewed wished to be labeled a victim of sexual abuse or assault. For these women, the term victim was diminishing because it connoted being helpless and elicited pity, as well as indicating "a position of vulnerability, and a position of weakness." Similarly, others identified themselves as victims only when they were coping with the negative sequelae of sexual violence: "When I was going through post- traumatic stress disorder, and anxiety attacks, and severe depression, and gaining 20 pounds, that's when I identified as a victim." Apart from the distinctions women made between de facto survivor status and earned survivor status, a theme present in all definitions was positive connotations, particularly that of strength and perseverance. Negative qualities attending the victim label, which include helplessness, passivity, and an inabil- ity to cope with daily life (Holstein and Miller 1990; see also Barry 1979), are undesirable. Thus, in contrast to charges by D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 273 critics of victim feminism that victim activists eschew the cele- bration of strength and victory in favor of a preoccupation with victimhood and oppression, evidence presented here suggests that the women strive to minimize feelings of weakness and vulnerability by emphasizing strength and agency in their defini- tion of survivorship. Data from my sample indicate an internalization of the nega- tive connotations of victimhood, as well as a disavowal and renegotiation of them. This disavowal and renegotiation of victim status exhibits agency in two ways. First, in and of itself, forwarding an alternate construction of victim demonstrates an agency that is inconsistent with the characteristics attributed to victims, namely passivity. Second, the women interviewed for this study differentiated themselves from prototypical victims by taking responsibility for ending dysfunctional patterns in their lives, desisting in self-blame, and focusing on emerging from a traumatic event alive. ACCENTUATING THE POSITIVE Holstein and Miller (1990) contended that a totalizing exoner- ation from responsibility may attend victim status, as well as a tendency by observers to make a stable attribution of helpless- ness and passivity to victims. Similarly, for the critics, sexual viol- ence victims and victim-activists are said to fixate on feelings of weakness, victimhood, and suffering. By contrast, the women in this sample consistently described positive aspects to the after- math of their experiences of sexual violence. Though they were careful to point out that being victimized was not positive, they perceived subsequent positive consequences in their lives. One young woman who had been raped twice during her teens commented, I know that I have become a lot stronger and I guess you could say more aware or tuned in to other people's feelings. I have learned a lot about myself and my strengths and weaknesses. . . . I have bad days, but most of the time I look at the positive things I can take out of the situation and try to apply them to everything I can do. I know being negative will only allow the rapists to win again and again. Typically, the women spoke of a personal transformation pre- cipitated by the abuse or assault that took the form of greater personal strength, an increased awareness of social processes, D o w n l o a d e d
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274 D. McCaffrey and also a greater sensitivity to other women who have been assaulted. In addition to benefiting from greater self-awareness and a sense of personal strength from surviving sexual violence, many described their activism as an important outcome. Contrary to the claims that women who have been assaulted or abused portray themselves as self-pitying victims, burdened by their own troubles, the women in this sample were not pre- occupied with self-pity, nor did they seek attention through vic- timhood. In fact, many actively resisted the victim role as they saw it: I don't feel like I've processed it like "poor [me], poor [me]" at all. But, I look at it in a larger context of patriarchy, power, and control, and a lot of other issues. Notthis is a personal issue, let's throw me a tea partykind of context. The picture that emerges from these statements is that of women who, when faced with adversity, do not dwell on the negative aspects of victimization but rather emerge with what one woman dubbed "warrior marks." Although the critics have forwarded an image of activists as those who glamorize victim- hood, celebrate suffering, and invent cases of sexual violence in order to feel oppressed, data suggest the opposite. STRENGTH IN ACTIVISM: PERSONAL AND POLITICAL Most of the women interviewed had spoken publicly about their experiences, often at Take Back the Night rallies, but also in high schools and colleges, on the news, and on the radio. The argument presented by many victim feminist critics is that those women who give public testimonials about their experiences of sexual violence are "whiners" or attention-seekers. For the women in this sample, speaking publicly provided satisfaction. 9 In particular, for a number of women, the act of telling their story was intrinsically empowering. According to one woman, 9 Three women mentioned that they did not feel particularly empowered by speaking pub- licly. For them, there was a sense of uneasiness that accompanied the knowledge that they would be publicly identified as a victim after speaking out. However, these women all stated that although they did not feel empowered at the time they spoke out, in retrospect they were glad they gave their testimonial. Moreover, all stated that they had subsequently realized that they had not been singled out and publicly stigmatized as victims. This response is interesting in light of the charges from critics that women who speak publicly want attention as victims and seek public pity. Evidence from my sample does not bear out this assertion. D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 275 It's definitely empowering! People need to know that rape victims aren't just statistics before they can even begin to under- stand what rape is, so I feel it is necessary to communicate. I also feel that keeping what happened inside will only allow the rapists to continue raping me [mentally] and by taking charge and moving on I can finally take back some of the power I lost to them. Additionally, one woman who was sexually abused for the majority of her childhood noted that "when I share my story it empowers me. [I: How come?] Just the act of not keeping it a secret anymore is a big deal." The underlying theme in these women's comments is that of empowerment through the act of telling their stories. For many, the empowerment is derived from a sense of revealing a long-held secret. Particularly in cases of child sexual abuse, secrecy is a state imposed by the offender(s) and often imposed through threats to the child (Herman 1992). Maintaining the secret of sexual abuse not only is an issue of shame or fear of stigma, but may also be experienced as collu- sion with the offender(s). Thus, the act of publicly revealing that secret can be liberating and empowering for the activists. If the claims that victim status carries exoneration from blame (Best 1997; Holstein and Miller 1990) and exemption from disbelief (Best 1997) were valid, there would be no need for secrecy or shame. 10 In addition to the empowerment derived from letting go of a secret, other activists spoke of the sense of empowerment gained from educating others. Several women stated that the intrinsic empowerment of telling their story was initially present but had simultaneously waned and been transformed into a sense of satisfaction in raising the awareness of others through their story. For example, one woman who was sexually abused by her father throughout her childhood stated, But do I tell them because I want them to know about my abuse? Not that I want them to know about the abuse as much as I want them to be aware that abuse exists and shouldn't. I think that's my drive. . . . I want people to know that when you do this to a child, that child doesn't just suffer at that moment. 10 For instance, one woman in my sample was ostracized from her peer group after report- ing to the police that she had been raped by a member of that peer group. Her peers accused her of lying and deliberately trying to divide the group. D o w n l o a d e d
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276 D. McCaffrey That child suffers until the day they die. And it's not fair. That's the whole bottom thing of why I talk about it. For this group of women, the motivation in speaking is not so much to relieve the burden of secrecy as to effect change in the larger social structure. That the activists in this sample deliber- ately parlayed their experiences into a political tool speaks to their commitment to consciousness raising rather than attention-seeking. Indeed, one of the activists speaks frequently at colleges and high schools across the country. Not only does she speak, but she analyzes policies, direct services, and preven- tion programs that each school has in place, serving as a consul- tant for improving institutional responses to the issue of sexual violence. On the surface, victim activism bears a striking resemblance to Brown's (1991) work on "professional ex-es," individuals with former food and substance addictions who "exit a deviant career (p. 219)" by becoming professional counselors for similar others. Similarities between sexual violence victim-activists and professional ex-addicts include that both view recovery as a long process and that helping others is a component of individ- ual healing. On further examination, however, some important differences emerge. First, Brown's (1991) professional ex-es abandoned pre- vious careers that were deemed "mundane and polluting (p. 226)" in favor of professional counseling careers. In my sample of 20 sexual violence victim-activists, only 6 derived their major source of income from professional activist work. The remaining 14 were unpaid volunteer activists. Therefore, in this sample, activism does not appear to be an explicit occupational strat- egy. Furthermore, counseling professionals are generally not included under the heading of activist. Perhaps the core difference is that Brown's (1991) ex-es were involved in substance abuse and eating disorders, activities that are constructed as more blameworthy or chosen. Here, the definition of victim is germane. Victim status is generally not conferred on substance abusers and people with eating dis- orders, whereas victim status is generally granted for those who have experienced sexual violence. 11 Rather than being viewed as morally deviant, or having a deviant identity, the trajectory of 11 Interestingly, there is a strong correlation between eating disorders and experiences of sexual violence (Benson 1997; Andrews 1997). D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 277 sexual violence victim-activists is more consistent with the liter- ature on social psychological trauma and recovery (Herman 1992; Janoff-Bulman 1992; see also Weed 1990). In examining the thoughts and experiences of women who have been sexually victimized, what emerges is a picture of women who focus on what they view as the positive aspects of surviving sexual violence: personal strength and empowerment through activism. Though they are cognizant of the manifold ways that sexual violence has altered them, they are not con- sumed in a culture of self-abnegation that glorifies martyrdom and suffering. Nor do they report pursuing activism as a means for shedding a deviant stigmatized identity. If anything, speaking publicly about one's victimization exposes one to the possibility of further censure. POWER: POSTMODERN APPLICATIONS In an effort to address and incorporate the challenge that the critics pose, an application of postmodern theorizing on power is useful. Though empirical evidence presented here suggests that victim-activists do not represent themselves as weak, passive, or powerless, the issue of power is not fully resolved. Under a postmodern model of power, it is not accurate to frame the debate in terms of whether women who have been sexually victimized do or do not have power. Again, the notion of pos- session of power is more consistent with a juridical framing of power than with a postmodern model of power. To argue that victims are powerless, weak, and helpless presupposes that power can be possessed and that it is not possessed by sexual violence victims. In a similar vein, the activists in this sample described their activism and their survivor identities as paths for reclaiming power that has been taken from them through victimization. Constructions of victim and survivor are consis- tent with a juridical framing of power because both cast power as an entity to be possessed, withdrawn, or denied. Applying postmodern views of power brings into relief the ways constructions of both victimhood and survival are replete with power. Because power is infused in discourse, discourse is never apart from power. One woman in the sample articulated the imbrication of discourse and experience in her account of childhood sexual abuse: D o w n l o a d e d
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278 D. McCaffrey In some ways sexual abuse is an ongoing experience, because even though the physical [aspect] may have stopped, it con- tinues to reverberate. And, having some political exposure and being able to redefine it as something that is social, and is some- thing that emerges out of the culture in which we live, it allowed me to reexperience it in a different way. Thus, "experience" and the identities formulated in response are mediated by the various discursive constructions that are avail- able to interpret events in our lives. Regardless of whether women view themselves as empowered and strong survivors or as stuck in a victim role where they lack agency, each of these is a function of the power that is inseparable from discourse. Thus, both the subject positions of victim or survivor must be understood as an effect of power rather than as lacking or pos- sessing power, respectively. Again, under a postmodern model of power, an important site for the exercise of power is discourse. To comprehend power in this manner is to acknowledge that power can operate as a productive or generative force, not merely in the form of rep- ression. Additionally, Foucault (1978) argued that "discourse can be both an instrument and an effect of power, but also a stum- bling block, a point of resistance and a starting point for an opposing strategy" (p. 101). Before the inception of the feminist antiviolence movement of the 1970s, the dominant discourse pathologized victims of sexual violence as "damaged goods," promiscuous, or essentially objects of abuse (Russell 1982; Barry 1979; Warshaw 1988). An illustration of how discourse can be a point of resistance is the movement's effort to redefine what it means to be victimized by sexual violence. Challenging each element of the dominant discursive constructions of sexual viol- ence victims, feminist activists reconfigured victim into survivor. The construction of survivor attends to the ways that abused and assaulted women use personal strengths to withstand abusive experiences and carry on with their lives (Kelly 1988). It is notable that this construction of survivor has been internal- ized to a significant degree by the women I interviewed. It appears, then, that women who have experienced sexual violence reposition themselves in the discursive milieu. I read this as an act of agency, an effort to construct powerful iden- tities. Although victim status is said to elicit responses such as pity or sympathy, survivor constructions seem designed to D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 279 evoke respect or admiration. Survivor rhetorically establishes that one has been victimized, yet also implies that one should be recognized for overcoming the often debilitating effects of sexual victimization. The women in this sample used the power of discourse to transform a stigmatized identity, victim, into a valorized self-definition, survivor. Not only does power operate on the interpersonal level, but there is a reciprocal relationship between the individual and institutional levels. The deployment of a transgressive survivor discourse also effects institutional change. 12 In the past decade, "survivor therapy" has been created by drawing from both trauma theories and feminist therapeutic principles (Walker 1994). By emphasizing personal strength and positive coping strategies, survivor therapy seeks to heal those who have been victimized. Additionally, survivor therapy recognizes "the gender-based impact of the trauma within the woman's socio- political, cultural, and economic context, emphasizing respect for all women who have been abused" (P. 285). The advent of survivor therapy marks the interplay between interpersonal and institutional diffusion of the survivor construction. This inter- play militates against hegemonic discourses that deny the extent of sexual violence (or worse, legitimate it) and silence those affected by it. The discursive terrain is marked by sufficient inde- terminacy that both dominant and victim discourses can be dis- turbed through the deployment of the survivor construction. Though there exists a subversive potential to a survivor identity, it is not inherently liberatory. Another aspect to Fou- cault's concept of power as a productive force is its normalizing effects. Recall that, for Foucault (1978), social identities rooted in the rise of human sciences can function as social control mechanisms through the process of normalization. Even those identities crafted in the name of resistance can produce normal- izing effects. In response to negative constructions of sexual viol- ence victims, the feminist antiviolence movement as well as feminists in the helping professions have deployed an alternative discourse about victim status, reconfigured as survival. Though 12 It is difficult to decisively locate the origins of the survivor construct. It appears to have emerged from both feminist politics (Barry 1979) and feminist therapy (Cooper-White 1990; Walker 1985). 13 The creation of survivor therapy is consistent with Best's (1997) observations about the victim industry. However, new therapeutic techniques for those affected by violence should not be framed as inherently negative or suspect. D o w n l o a d e d
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280 D. McCaffrey this was a strategy for resisting the dominant discourse on victims, and most recently the backlash to the movement, the identity of survivor also normalizes. First, in the case of women who have experienced sexual viol- ence, there is suggestion of an appropriate way to experience victimhoodwhich entails not being a victim but rather being a survivor. Specifically, there exists an expectation that there is something positive to be gained from the negative experience of abuse or assault. This construction effects its own normalizing tendencies that may produce new marginalizations and new exclusions among women who have experienced sexual viol- ence. For instance, women who do not perceive their experi- ences of sexual violence as life altering may be marginalized by the survivor discourse. Similarly, women who do not perceive positive outcomes from their experiences may also be margin- alized or, worse yet, be stigmatized as victims. So, even a dis- course that is deployed with transgressive intent may marginalize. Second, Alcoff and Gray (1993) discussed the danger of an emergent "coercive imperative" for survivors to speak out, if giving testimonials is positioned as an essential ingredient for recovery in the survivor discourse. Thus, although the power inherent in speaking out and breaking the silence can be appro- priated as a ground for resistance, it may also produce new dominations. A third cautionary note is the issue of who is reconfiguring the discourse and how various subjects are positioned in rela- tion to that discourse. Many of the critics of victim feminism, including hooks, Paglia, and Roiphe, have noted that the lead- ership of and many activists in the antiviolence movement are, for the most part, White women who are privileged by class and education. Hence we must question who is structurally posi- tioned to engage in resistance through the deployment of the survivor construction (as well as other movement strategies). Additionally, the survivor discourse does not currently incorpor- ate a juxtaposition of male dominance with other forms of oppression based on sexuality, class, race, or nationality. A final cautionary note involves acknowledgment of how even a resisting discourse may be co-opted by the dominant discourse. For instance, Alcoff and Gray (1993) have suggested that there is a voyeuristic element to survivor testimonials where, particularly in TV talk show testimonials, there is an inap- D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 281 propriate emphasis on the details of the abuse, which are corn- modified for the consumption of the audience. The voyeurism accompanying survivor speak-outs undercuts the subversive character of the speech, resulting in a loss of the transgressive or subversive potential of the challenging discourse. In addition to voyeurism, co-optation may be realized through the recuperation of the resisting survivor discourse by the dominant discourse. Because discourse is malleable and characterized by indeterminacy, a resisting survivor discourse is not inherently transgressive, regardless of the aim. Thus, through recuperation, dominant discourses regain "their hegemonic position even when disruptive speech is not silenced by sub- suming it within the framework of the discourse in such a way that it is disempowered and no longer disruptive" (Alcoff and Gray 1993:68). For instance, because much of the survivor dis- course emphasizes personal strength and healing, attention can be deflected from the structural supports for sexual violence. Additionally, Louise Armstrong (1994) argued that the general issue of childhood sexual abuse, particularly incest, has been hijacked from the realm of feminist social change politics and reduced to a medicalized and psychologized personal dis- order. 14 CONCLUSION Postmodern sketches of the productive capacity of power help illuminate the debate surrounding victim feminism and victim activism. In this article, I have argued that conceptualiz- ing victim or survivor identities as being devoid of power or possessing power, respectively, deflects attention from the power's productive character and normalizing effects. Because of the significance of the debate for the anti-sexual violence movement and for the larger feminist movement, there are many important areas that could be explored in future research. Within the field of social movements, issues of identity have increasingly been recognized as central in mobilization. Future research should flesh out the implications of the particu- lar construction of survivor as a collective identity for move- ment strategy and mobilization. For instance, is there a 14 This parallels Best's (1997) argument about the dangers of the burgeoning victim industry but differs in that Best argued that the victim/survivor discourse is the dominant discourse, whereas Armstrong (1994) aligned the survivor discourse with a resistant feminist politic. D o w n l o a d e d
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282 D. McCaffrey normative expectation among survivors that being a survivor entails activism? In addition, research should focus on the devel- opment of a collective identity within the anti-sexual violence movement. In particular, future work should explore when and how such an identity develops, if at all. In addition, issues of the underrepresentation of women of color in the feminist antiviolence movement deserve empirical attention. Future research should explore the paths through which women of color who have been sexually victimized become involved in anti-sexual violence work and whether important philosophical or structural differences exist between those activists and women of color who have been victimized and are not involved in activist work. Bearing in mind hooks's (1984) contention that it is the most privileged of women who readily adopt a victim identity, such work should examine the relationship between the current survivor discourse and experi- ences and interpretation of women of color from varying class backgrounds. Finally, following Alcoff and Gray (1993), in formulating a viable political strategy in the movement against sexual viol- ence, the mere incitement to speak about abusive experiences renders survivors and the survivor discourse susceptible to recuperation by the dominant discourse. Instead, attention should be devoted to devising strategies for maintaining auton- omy from expert interpretation of experiences of sexual viol- ence, as well as a reflexive eye toward the normalizing and disciplining effects of the discourse. REFERENCES Alcoff, Linda and Gray, Laura. 1993. "Survivor Discourse: Transgression or Recuper- ation?' Signs 18(21):260-290. Andrews, Bernice. 1997. "Bodily Shame in Relation to Abuse in Childhood and Bulimia: A Preliminary Investigation." British Journal of Clinical Psychology 36(1):41- 49. Armstrong, Louise. 1994. Rocking the Cradle of Sexual Politics: What Happened when Women Said Incest. New York: Addison-Wesley. Barry, Kathleen. 1979. Female Sexual Slavery. New York: New York University Press. Benson, Sally. 1997. "Sexual Abuse and Eating Disorders." British Journal of Clinical Psychology 36(1):156-157. Best, Joel. 1997. "Victimization and the Victim Industry." Society 3. Brown, J. David. 1991. "The Professional Ex-: An Alternative for Exiting the Deviant Career." The Sociological Quarterly 32(2):219-230. D o w n l o a d e d
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Victim Feminism/Victim Activism 283 Butler, Judith. 1990. Gender Trouble. New York: Routledge. Cooper-White, Pamela. 1990. "Peer vs. Clinical Counseling: Is There a Place for Both in the Battered Women's Movement?" Response 13(3):2-6. Estrich, Susan. 1986. "Rape." Yale Law Journal 95:1087-1184. Fairstein, Linda. 1993. Sexual Violence: Our War Against Rape. New York: William Morrow. Foucault, Michel. 1973. Madness and Civilization. New York: Vintage. . 1978. The History of Sexuality. Vol. 1. New York: Vintage. . 1979. Discipline and Punish. New York: Vintage. . 1980. Power/Knowledge. New York: Pantheon. Frankl, Victor, 1963. Man's Search for Meaning. New York: Washington Square Press. Goodman, Lisa, Mary Koss, and Nancy Russo. 1993. "Violence Against Women: Physi- cal and Mental Health Effects. Part I: Research Findings." Applied & Preventive Psychology 2:79-89. Herman, Judith Lewis. 1992. Trauma and Recovery. New York: Basic Books. Holstein, James A. and Miller. 1990. "Rethinking Victimization: An Interactional Approach to Victimology." Symbolic Interaction 13(1):103-122. hooks, bell. 1984. Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center. Boston: South End Press. Hughes, Robert. 1992. "The Fraying of America." Time 28:44-49. Janoff-Bulman, Ronnie. 1992. Shattered Assumptions. New York: Free Press. Kelly, Liz. 1988. Surviving Sexual Violence. Oxford, United Kingdom: Polity Press. Lachner, Irene. 1993. "The Rape Debate." Los Angeles Times, October 17, pp. Leo, John. 1992. "The Trouble with Feminism." U.S. News and World Report, 19 Feb- ruary. Mahoney, Martha. 1991. "Legal Images of Battered Women: Redefining the Issue of Separation." Michigan Law Review 90(1):5-79. . 1994. "Victimization or Oppression? Women's Lives, Violence and Agency." Pp. 59-91 in The Public Nature of Private Violence, edited by Martha Fineman and Roxanne Mykiutiuk. New York: Routledge. Morgenson, Gretchen. 1992. "A Whiner's Bible." Forbes 16:152-153. Paglia, Camille. 1994. Vamps and Tramps. Vintage Books. Pollitt, Katha. 1993. "Not Just Bad Sex." The New Yorker, October 4, 220-224. Quinney, Richard. 1972. "Who Is the Victim?" Criminology 10:314-323. Roiphe, Katie. 1993. The Morning After. Boston: Little, Brown. Russell, Diana. 1982. Rape in Marriage. New York: Macmillan. Sawicki, Jana. 1991. Disciplining Foucault. New York: Routledge. Seidman, Steven. 1994. Contested Knowledge. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell. Spohn, Cassia, and Horney, Julie. 1992. Rape Law Reform: A Grassroots Revolution and Its Impact New York: Plenum Press. Walker, Lenore. 1985. "Feminist Therapy with Victim/Survivors of Interpersonal Viol- ence." Pp. 203-214 in Handbook of Feminist Therapy, edited by Lynne Rosewater and Lenore Walker. New York: Springer. . 1994. Abused Women and Survivor Therapy. Washington DC: American Psychological Association. Warshaw, Robin. 1988. I Never Called It Rape. New York: Sarah Lazin Books. D o w n l o a d e d
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