Narrative encounters with children experiencing domestic violence; time to shift the approach?

Carolina Överlien, Associate professorInstitution of Social Work, Stockholm University

Norwegian Center for Violence and Traumatic Stress Studies (NKVTS), Oslo

Children exposure to domestic violence : International conversations for innovative research and practicesUniversity of OttawaApril 9th– 10th 2015

Where it all started…

A shift of approach

Findings (Överlien, 2010)

• The deficit model of childhood (still) dominates research on children and

domestic violence

• The literature is (still) dominated by a medical/pathological discourse were

children who experience domestic violence are understood as victims and

passive recipients (‘children suffer in silence’) of potentially traumatic

experiences

• Children are being described as being exposed to DV (catastrophes/accidents)

• The majority of research has consequently been focused on identifying,

measuring and describing symptoms and reactions, drawing on theories of child

development, trauma and/or socialization.

• It could result in developing treatment and methods that undermines children’s own resistance to violence by predominantly positioning children as victims and innocent bystanders.

• Focusing on symptoms and effects has overshadowed what many who work with children in difficult life situation knows; that many children never show any symptoms and seemingly live lives that to a large extent look like other children’s lives.

• It could blur our vision in regards to children’s and adolescents’ own responses to the violence in their lives. We focus on how they feel rather than on what the do/did.

The image of passive exposed children do not correspond well to the way children present themselves and their lives in qualitative interviews (cf. Georgsson et. al, 2011; Øverlien & Hydén, 2009; McGee, 2000; Mullender et al., 2002; Ornduff & Monahan, 1999; Peled,1998).

• Children’s experiences of life at shelters for abused women

Evang, A., & Överlien, C. (2014). ‘If you look, you have to leave’: Young children regulating research interviews about experiences of domestic violence. Journal of Early Childhood Research. doi:10.1177/1476718X14538595

Överlien, C. (2013). Children exposed to domestic violence: A discussion about research ethics and researchers’ responsibilities. Nordic Social Work Research. doi:10.1080/2156857X.2013.801878

• Children’s strategies – children’s resistance Överlien, C. (2013). The Children of Patriarchal Terrorism. Journal of family

Violence, 28(3), 277-287. doi:10.1007/s10896-013-9498-9 Överlien, C. (2012). “He didn’t mean to hit mom, I think”: Positioning, agency and

point in adolescents’ narratives about domestic violence. Child & Family Social Work. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2206.2012.00886.x

Överlien, C. & Hyden, M. (2009) Children's actions when experiencing domestic violence. Childhood, 16(4), 479-496.

What can we learn about being an adolescent and having experienced domestic violence using a narrative approach?

• Why is the narrative told in that specific time and context?

• Who are the actors in the narratives? • Who are positioned in the forefront as opposed to

the background?• What is the point of the narrative?

Content

• Point (Bamberg 2004)• Meaning (Bamberg 2004)• Positioning and agency (Davies & Harre’ 1990)

Grace, 18 years old

Interviewer: Can you tell me about a specific situation

when you woke up in the middle of the night and it [the

violence] had happened, what happened and what did you

do?

Grace: It was night, it was like two or three, and I slept but

then I heard mom screaming, she said ‘let me go, don’t

touch me’, and I

just jumped out of bed and ran to the kitchen, then I saw

him putting his arms around her neck, and she screamed

and screamed

so I screamed to him ‘let her go, let her go’, and he just

looked at me and did nothing

Interviewer: hm

Grace:He just continued, and with mom screaming and me screaming we woke up my little sister, she came and when she saw what was happening she started to cry and scream and collapsed and didn’t know what to do with herself, and then he stopped

Interviewer: then he stopped when he saw that

Grace: Yes, and then he let go, mom went to the bathroom and stayed there, and my sister and I just trembled and trembled.

Content

• A narrative filled with drama and fear (‘jumped out of bed’, ‘ran to the kitchen’).

• Main actors: father, little sister• Mother is positioned in the background (passive,

needing)• The point of the narrative is to describe:

- the seriousness of the violence experienced and thereby her father’s dangerousness

- the important role of the children in the family.

Hanne, 12 years old

Interviewer: How was it when mom and dad were fighting?

Hanne:The thing was, it was Christmas day, and we were going to have a party, and dad only invited his family, and not my mom’s family, and then mom got a bit cross, ‘cause she wanted her family there, and then my dad got cross, and then they started to fight, then my mom got so angry she packed our clothes and said we were going to my grandparents, but when we were about to leave my dad didn’t want us to leave,

then he hit my mom and me and my little sister got really

scared and started to cry, and then dad started to

cry,‘cause he really didn’t want to hit mom, he just got so

cross,‘cause when he was little he also experienced

violence, his dad almost killed his mom, and that is why he

gets so very, very angry when he gets angry sort of, he

goes kind of crazy, but he doesn’t mean to do it, he didn’t

mean to hit mom, I think, and then mom got sad and we

left for grandma and grandpa, but I was really sad ‘cause I

didn’t want to leave daddy’

Content

• Constructs her father as a product of his childhood experience, as a reluctant aggressor shaped by his past (the point)

• ‘I think’ (explanation given to her, not convinced?)

• Main actors: father, mother (objects to herhusbands’ controlling behaviour, takes the children to her grandparents)• Mother is positioned as active & resisting

Aref, 16 years old

My brother said ‘don’t curse mom’, the [their father]

grabbed my brother’s neck really hard, I was trying to

comfort my mom and suddenly I saw him forcing his nails

into my brother’s neck, so I pushed him away, my brother

got three long scratch marks, then he tried again to go for

my brother, I pushed him away, my brother was screaming

at him, he [the father] said ‘leave the house’, my brother

said ‘sure’, he left and I told my mom to pack her things we

were leaving

I took my little sister, the youngest, and then my father took her from me,‘I have a right to have her, you will never get her’, I thought ‘fine, you won’t get her anyway’, then we were thrown out . . . I went home, my dad was awake and was screaming and cussing ‘where is he’ [the brother] and then he went out, I called my brother ‘come home and sleep some’, we slept, one two hours, we packed our stuff and got away

Content

• Narrative of a dramatic and potentially fatal situation

• Main actors: Aref and his brother• Mother is positioned in the background

(weak)• Father is also positioned as weak (cursing,

drinking, illegitimate relationships, attacking his older son, but questioned and stopped by Aref)

• The point is to describe the agency and responsibility of the brothers

Looking accross all narratives…

• Few resolutions that can ascribe meaning (meaning making one of the most important function of narratives)

• Few evaluations - little expression of feelings (stacking up of sequential events)

• The father’s role as the reluctant/dangerous/weak aggressor is negotiated and renegotiated.

• Mother in most narratives is positioned in the background as a victim, but also in the forefront as an actor resisting the father’s controlling and violent behavior to the point of defying him

• The teller positions him/herself and other children in the forefront of the narrative. The adolescent describes him/herself as an actor with the power to protect, to alter the progress of an episode or even to stop the violence from occurring.

This picture of the father, mother and child questions the traditional understanding of the father as the aggressor, the mother as the victim and the child as a powerless bystander exposed to the violence, and underlines the complexities in the dynamics in families living with domestic violence.