Intimate Partner Violence

When one hears of violence against women many may think solely that it involves such things as physical abuse such as bruses or broken bones, and others may think sexual abuse such as rape. In fact violence against women can take the shape of many different act. Guruge, Roche, and Catallo (2012) describe violence against women as a global phenomenon that can be in the form of physical, sexual, and psychological acts of control, threat, aggression, abuse, and assault. This type of violence is demonstrated through acts such as female infanticide, female child abuse, incest, rape, sexual harassment, intimate partner violence (IPV), and abuse and neglect of our senior women. These horrible acts are experienced by women from people such as close and distant family members, neighbors, and my men who hold a position of power.

Lets take a closer look into IPV or intimate partner violence. IPV is defined as a physical, sexual, emotional and/or financial abuse carried out by an intimate partner as stated in Vol 2. Issue 6 of the BMJ Open. I would think that this form of abuse is very difficult on women let alone an immigrant women. If you can imagine yourself as a women who is perhaps leaving her home, family, friends, and all her familiar surroundings to accompany her intimate partner to another country. She has no support around her, and perhaps barely speaks the local language. Dealing with the transition of a completely new world is hard enough to adjust to, but to also deal with abuse from the person she has made all these life changes for seems rather unfair and not to mention cruel.

Women world wide are experiencing this same type of abuse. When comparing immigrant women to canadian born, the levels of abuse does vary but in all areas, between cultural groups, types of abuse and levels of abuse. There have been no studies determining that immigrant women receive more or less abuse from their intimate partners then Canadian born women. Although women who are living in an institution or some form of temporary accommodation seem to be predominantly susceptible to this form of abuse by men who are in a power position or by their intimate partner being the ones placing them here, therefore abusing them through isolation.

This form a treatment towards women has to come to an end. Women are supposed to be considered an equal in todays society and yet still we still suffer through abuse and inequality. There are many organization that are fighting against these issues such as Because I am a Girl, Act to End, and YWCA Rose Campaign.




-Denise





References

- Guruge, S., Roche, B., & Catallo, C., (2012). Violence against Women: An Exploration of the Physical and Mental Health Trends among Immigrant and Refugee women in Canada. Hindawi Publishing Corporation Nursing and Research Practice, 1-15.

- Du Monte, J., Forte, T., (2012). An Exploratory Study on the consequences and contextual factors of intimate partner violence among immigrant and Canadian-born women. BMJ Open access medical research, 2:e001728.

doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2012-001728.

- Image retrieved from Irishhealth.com

- Act to End: http://www.jwicanada.com/

- Because I am a Girl: http://becauseiamagirl.ca/page.aspx?pid=3816

- YWCA Rose Campaign: http://ywcacanada.ca/en/pages/rose/about