The coloniality of gender, or “saving” migrant victims of intimate partner violence

The coloniality of gender, or “saving” migrant victims of intimate partner violence

This article is based on empirical research on how women suffering from intimate partner violence are received and counseled by a hospital in French-speaking Switzerland. The analytical framework mobilizes intersectionality to uncover how Swiss national identity is invoked by healthcare professionals working with migrant women, with the aim of making them aware that the violence they are experiencing is unacceptable in Switzerland. The invocation of Switzerland in this discourse implies that these victims’ presumed lack of awareness of what they are going through is rooted in their culture of origin, a culture where this violence is supposedly considered normal. In contrast, Swiss women’s similar lack of awareness of the violence they are experiencing is attributed to psychological problems, to be treated through psychotherapy. From the perspective of public policy evaluation, the results show that, in the end, the institutional response to both categories of women fails to adequately protect them from intimate partner violence, though in different ways. From a theoretical perspective, this research highlights how the intersectional relationships between gender and race must be complexified in order to take into account the coloniality of gender as it is “done” in the exchanges between healthcare professionals and women victims of intimate partner violence.

Keywords

• intersectionality
• domestic violence
• intimate partner violence
• sexism and racism
• medical institutions
• coloniality of gender