Web resource:	https://www.crimejusticejournal.com/article/viewFile/211/pdf
Type:	Journal Article
Title:	Cultures of abuse: 'Sex grooming', organised abuse and race in Rochdale, UK
Authors:	Dagistanli, Selda Salter, Michael
Keywords:	Law;Race;Culture;Sexual abuse;Media coverage
Year:	2015
Citation:	Vol. 4, no. 2
Notes:	"This paper reflects on the similarities between the highly publicised 'sex grooming' prosecutions in Rochdale in 2012 and the allegations of organised abuse in Rochdale that emerged in 1990, when twently children were taken into care after describing sadistic abuse by their parents and others. While these two cases differ in important aspects, this paper highlights the prominence of colonial ideologies of civilisation and barbarism in the investigation and media coverage of the two cases and the sublimation of the issue of child welfare. There are important cultural and normative antecedents to sexual violence but these have been misrepresented in debates over organised abuse as racial issues and attributed to ethnic minority communities. In contrast, the colonialist trope promulgating the fictional figure of the rational European has resulted in the denial of the cultural and normative dimenstions of organised abuse in ethnic majority communities by attributing sexual violence to aberrant and sexually deviant individuals whose behaviours transgress the boundaries of accepted cultural norms. This paper emphasises how the implicit or explicit focus on race has served to obscure the power dynamics underlying both cases and the continuity of vulnerability that places children at risk of sexual and organised abuse." Open access
URI:	https://anrows.intersearch.com.au/anrowsjspui/handle/1/14107
Appears in Collections:	Journal Articles

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