This thesis covers the significance of empowering women who have been vulnerable to sexual violence in the conflicted Kupwara district, in particular Kunan Poshpora in the Kashmir Valley. This is...Show moreThis thesis covers the significance of empowering women who have been vulnerable to sexual violence in the conflicted Kupwara district, in particular Kunan Poshpora in the Kashmir Valley. This is done by looking at and comparing how non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and locally-led female movements strive to improve women’s wellbeing and participation in the region. To do so, this research paper attempted to answer the following research question: “How have NGO-organised women’s empowerment programmes impacted women’s participation in the Kupwara district compared to locally-led female self-emancipating groups following the rise of armed insurgencies and resulting sexual violence in Kashmir?” While previous research covers the role of NGOs and grassroots female activism in emancipating women, there is a gap in literature regarding their comparative positions. NGOs are considered apolitical agents and must remain neutral actors in supporting women throughout the conflict. However, their position is frequently challenged due to governmental restrictions and local suspicions in Kashmir. On the other hand, female-led activism aims to achieve political objectives by protesting for justice and liberation, and offering women a platform to share their traumas. This paper discovered that both organisations are interconnected in aspiring to emancipate women who have been victimised in Kashmir, albeit in different ways. The issue at hand lies fundamentally deeper than short-term solutions offered by NGOs or grassroots movements, and a plethora of factors need to be taken into account by both actors to successfully emancipate women in Kashmir.Show less
Concerning transitional justice, the turn towards advocating for localized action and gendered analysis has engendered a focus on female agency. In documentary film studies, a similar pattern...Show moreConcerning transitional justice, the turn towards advocating for localized action and gendered analysis has engendered a focus on female agency. In documentary film studies, a similar pattern emerges: over time, scholars have started to question prevailing representations of women, and to celebrate well-rounded, agentive representations. This thesis, which analyzes representations of female agency and victimhood in documentaries concerning sexual violence during the Yugoslav Wars, utilizes an interdisciplinary approach which draws from both of these fields. It incorporates the aesthetic analytical tools provided by documentary film scholars to analyze Sexual Violence and the Triumph of Justice (2012) and Mission Rape - a Tool of War (2014), while keeping as its main focus the gendered agency framework created by Björkdahl and Mannergren Selimović. Thus, it marries the two disciplines to provide a thorough understanding of prominent issues in transitional justice. This concerns both how transitional justice is practiced and how this practice is portrayed to the public by challengers and proponents of the prominent methods in the transitional justice space. I hope to contribute to knowledge in both fields, and to demonstrate how well-rounded and agentive representations of women’s agency can challenge the traditional narrative of passivity and victimization of women in conflict-zones.Show less
This cross-disciplinary thesis investigated the use of metaphors in modern and contemporary Lebanese literature which portrays Beirut as a woman, and violence or turmoil within the city as sexual...Show moreThis cross-disciplinary thesis investigated the use of metaphors in modern and contemporary Lebanese literature which portrays Beirut as a woman, and violence or turmoil within the city as sexual assaults. Both of these metaphors were identified in texts by Zena el Khalil, Elias Khoury and Etal Adnan, along with shorts from Beirut Noir. Lakoff’s theory of metaphor was used to underline the significant interactions between figurative language, knowledge and real action which motivated the research. The mother-virgin-whore triad was found overly simplistic to describe Beirut’s figuration, although interestingly non-normative characterisations such as corrupted mother and once-virgin arise in the literature. However, Beirut has been consistently imagined as a ‘whore’ throughout history. This stereotyping has a particularly complex impact on the allocation of blame and pity in the related literary imagery of Beirut’s ‘rape’, which was further dissected through feminist and critical theory. Overall, an interrelation between machoistic violence and the destruction city was identified, exemplified in Civil War literature but arising in broader contexts. This thesis' intersectional question merited a broad, multi-stranded answer, concluding that imaginaries of women and cities alike must be nuanced and multiple in order to escape harmful stereotyping which can ‘justify’ destructive action.Show less
