Assignment Prompt & Instructions
Read the assigned readings below before proceeding with this assignment. You should always take notes as you work through the content, perhaps using a [note-taker like this oneLinks to an external site.](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1W4esysAweh8Y4mqnp6PEOr-h8jskxQBa-15oEfjuPhk/edit?usp=sharing). Save your notes in a dedicated folder for this class.
Start by reading the assigned readings:
ch.11 I have attached
https://openbooks.library.umass.edu/introwgss/chapter/intersecting-institutions-case-study-the-struggle-to-end-gendered-violence-and-violence-against-women/
"Intersecting Institutions Case Study: The Struggle to End Gendered Violence and Violence against Women" from Introduction to Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies by Kang et al.
– ["Intersecting Institutions Case Study: The Struggle to End Gendered Violence and Violence against Women"Links to an external site.](https://openbooks.library.umass.edu/introwgss/chapter/intersecting-institutions-case-study-the-struggle-to-end-gendered-violence-and-violence-against-women/) from _Introduction to Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies_ by Kang et al.
Audio recording of the reading:
– The third reading is embedded in the lecture below.
### **Gendered Violence**
Throughout the course we have examined how the **gender expectations** are reinforced in families, healthcare, media, the workplace, and other systems that touch our lives. Our culture has various methods for reinforcing the hierarchies and maintaining systems of privilege and oppression.
Unfortunately, the ultimate culmination of this enforcement of binary gender expectations is the prevalence of **gendered violence**, a structural problem that is deeply embedded in unequal power relationships between men and women, and the disparagement of femininity, sexual minorities, and gender minorities. Such violence is perpetuated by harmful social and cultural expectations about **gender** **expectations** typically associated with being (or being perceived as) a woman or a man, a girl or a boy. It functions as a mechanism for enforcing and sustaining gender inequality. People who are subjected to violence receive the message that they are worth less than others and that they do not have control over their own lives and bodies.
It's important to remember here that **gendered violence** is based on power dynamics. In Chapter 11, bell hooks reminds us of these power dynamics within families, and emphasizes, again, the importance of systemic change–to challenge hierarchies and imbalances of power–as she reminds readers that it is often women who perpetuate acts of violence in the home, especially those against children.
As of this writing in 2025, amidst abortion restrictions, pronatalism, and politicians saying publicly that they want "more babies" and more "parents" to stay at home to care for them–while also stripping away the social services that make having children feasible for many people, and in a world of increased tariffs, rising prices, and low wages–it is becoming clear that there is a political movement to reinstate **separate spheres** for women and men. Remember, separate spheres is an ideology that posits that women should be relegated to the private sphere, the home, through care taking and support of their families, while men should be in charge of the public sphere, as workers, lawmakers, politicians, and every position that holds power and shapes the systems of society.
The below quote from Chapter 11 of hooks highlights how patriarchal domination in the home is influenced by hegemonic masculinity and how it's enforced in the public sphere. If we move toward reinstatement of separate spheres, how much worse will this problem be? Here's the quote:
"Men are socialized by ruling-class groups of men to accept domination in the public world of work and to believe that the private world of home and intimate relationships will restore to them the sense of power they equate with masculinity. As more men have entered the ranks of the unemployed or receive how wages and more women have entered the world of work, some men feel that the use of violence is the only way they can establish and maintain power and dominance within the sexist sex role hierarchy. Until they unlearn the sexist thinking that tells them they have a right to rule over women by any means, male violence against women will continue to be a norm" (65).
Lastly, consider the role of queer families in separate sphere ideologies (same-sex couples, polyamorous families, couples where a partner identifies as trans or non-binary, to name a few examples). Where are they in this ideology? Nowhere. This is an ideology that depends on and reinforces the gender binary. It becomes clear, then, why LGBTQ+ individuals are the first ones targeted in movements such as those that are working to reinforce separate spheres, or that characterize themselves as promoting "family values" or "traditional values."
### **Rape Culture**
One result of the prevalence of these power dynamics and violent interactions in society is something we call **rape culture**: A society or environment whose prevailing social attitudes have the effect of normalizing or trivializing sexual assault and abuse. We use the term rape _culture_ to emphasize that this is a widespread problem _within society-_-not just a few evil people who do bad things. The way we structure gender in our society directly results in this type of violent culture, one in which women are _taught_ to devote time and energy every day to taking precautions to ensure they don't get raped–from what they wear, to what time of day they can go for a run outside, to going to the bathroom in groups, carrying pepper spray, walking to their cars with their keys sticking out between their fingers. I'm sure this list sounds familiar to many of you. And to be clear, women are not the _only_ victims of sexual violence–but they are the most impacted by rape culture, and the cultural messaging that teaches women to always work to prevent rape, and then blames them when they become victims of this [way-too-commonLinks to an external site.](https://www.rainn.org/statistics/victims-sexual-violence) violent crime.
Complete and submit this handout: [Gendered Violence Activity Google DocLinks to an external site.](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VcJtdPNLQx1wVL836Gsa5Uzz0wYOFgVGgfP7oTQ4_TY/edit?usp=sharing)
I attached the worksheet
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Ch11.hooks.violence.pdf](https://www.sweetstudy.com/files/ch11-hooks-violence-pdf "Ch11.hooks.violence.pdf")
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worksheet.docx](https://www.sweetstudy.com/files/worksheet-docx-10339919 "worksheet.docx")