Structural and Cultural Violence:
Sites and systems of violence in girls' lives
Structural and Cultural Violence:
Sites and systems of violence in girls' lives
Underpinning and reinforcing interpersonal violence are the systems and structures of patriarchy, imperialism and white supremacist violence that shape girls personal experiences, underlying belief systems and the apparatus of their communal lives.
From the crushing every day weight of white supremacy and racism to the colonialism and explicit anti-Blackness activists face in organisations globally – the continuum of racism shows up across her life and her resistance trajectory. Homophobia and transphobia are often defined by early experiences of internalised shame and rejection – where girls are forced to deny or hide their true selves – and the very real risk of physical violence, isolation and rejection when they are discovered or dare to speak out. Layer on sexism, ageism, ableism, adultism, xenophobia, gendered poverty – and the systems and institutions that were birthed by them – immigration systems, prisons, schools, health systems – all of these conspire to weigh on girls in deeply violent ways.
Because trauma is so often left unhealed, trauma is passed down generation to generation, through family members before her or through historical trauma that impacts entire communities. Across all of the systems and institutions girls interact with – as they grow into their adolescence and as they step into their resistance – girls face violence. Indeed perhaps one of the cruelest and most insidious blows to girls lives and freedoms is the further discrimination and rejection they can experience as they enter movement space in search of a political home.
Those of us who have a disability, we know that it is not easy to go out there; even though we accompany each other… unfortunately there are many of us who experience different forms of violence out there
– Elizabeth, Mexico
This is a mask, this is made of leather. A friend of mine who is a shoe maker made it for me. Actually, I asked him to make it for me. Once seeing a footballer wearing a mask because of his injury, so it gave me an idea that I should use a mask too. Several times I attempted to make the same thing with paper and other things but it didn’t work out. So, when I met this friend who is in our team, made me this mask. I told him to make me something as a mask so I can appear in the competition but so no one should recognise me, you see our competition is televised so I didn’t want anyone to see my face and recognise me.
My mother is aware of what I am doing. But my brothers and elders in the family, and other members of my extended family they don’t know that I am participating in sports. In our community, especially in Afghanistan they don’t deem it suitable for a girl to participate openly in sports. In spite of all that I love to participate and I open the way to play for my team, for myself and my family and make them proud.
Anonymous, Afghanistan
My mum had stayed in Saudi Arabia because she was taking care of everybody in Eritrea, so she had to work so I was on my own in Germany and I really fought back to finish school as a refugee girl without family to really fight against all the odds, being a refugee, not having documents… So it was so difficult, one is the issue with not having documents and not knowing whether you will be able to really stay in the country and as a child there was no space to go through and until I was early 21 I didn’t have proper documents to have a sustained future in Germany.
I remember growing up in Germany, the first few years every 3 months I have to go to the immigration office to stamp my residence permit and maybe like a week before my appointment I didn’t sleep because I didn’t know what was expecting me. So, this kind of bureaucratic biography it really has shaped me a lot. A lot of uncertainties so I can imagine how people, especially being a refugee in Europe is very, very difficult, and then on top of that encountering racism and aggressions towards black girls from your teachers, from other people on the road. This was something that has definitely shaped me in my life.
– Asia, Eritrea
- Explore: Why Girls Resist
