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Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://anrows.intersearch.com.au/anrowsjspui/handle/1/15920
Record ID: 39333141-22e2-4f63-9771-a8bc6b2b5e86
Web resource: http://sydney.edu.au/law/slr/slr28_4/Hunter.pdf
Type: Journal Article
Title: Narratives of domestic violence
Other Titles: The Sydney law review
Authors: Hunter, Rosemary
Keywords: Protection orders;Criminal justice responses;Theories of violence
Year: 2007
Publisher: Faculty of Law
Citation: 28 (4), 2007
Notes:  General Overview: :The author considers comments made by Victorian judicial officers in protection order matters and finds that they do not demonstrate a feminist understanding of domestic violence.

Discussion: :This article draws upon literature, the findings of empirical studies of protection order and family law proceedings, and the author’s own study of intervention order proceedings in Victoria, to contrast feminist understandings of domestic violence with judicial understandings of domestic violence.

Feminist understandings include knowing that domestic violence is a gendered phenomenon, that it includes the exercise of power and control, that it is exercised in many ways other than physical violence, that it has a severe psychological impact, that children are affected and that it does not necessarily end at separation. Hunter also summarises some extensions of feminist understandings from the perspective of women with disabilities, lesbian women, immigrant women and Aboriginal women.

She contrasts these understandings with non-feminist understandings, which include the belief that domestic violence is about physical assault, is caused by relationship conflict, will end when the relationship ends, is the responsibility of both parties and is a feature of certain ethnic communities rather than white Australians. The author relies on comments and orders made by magistrates to demonstrate that their understandings conform more to non-feminist than to feminist understandings. She recommends that feminist understandings should become part of the knowledge base of judicial officers.

While the great majority of women applying for intervention orders were successful, the fact that the orders were of short duration and had wide exceptions for child contact meant that the orders may not have improved their safety.
URI: https://anrows.intersearch.com.au/anrowsjspui/handle/1/15920
ISSN: 0082-0512
Appears in Collections:Journal Articles

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