Entrenched, Unrelenting, Unsettled: Cultural Essentialism in International Development Research on Domestic Violence in Nepal

Author:

Willey-Sthapit Claire1ORCID,Lindhorst Taryn2,Kemp Susan34,Magarati Maya56

Affiliation:

1. School of Social Welfare, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS, USA

2. School of Social Work, Center for Integrative Oncology and Palliative Care Social Work, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA

3. Faculty of Education and Social Work, School of Counselling Human Services and Social Work/Te Kura Tauwhiro Tangata, The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

4. School of Social Work, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA

5. Community Collaboration in Research at Seven Directions, A Center for Indigenous Public Health, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA

6. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Center for the Study of Health and Risk Behaviors, School of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA

Abstract

Domestic violence (DV) is a serious problem that reinforces patriarchy and interlocking systems of oppression. Yet, as a form of gender-based violence, DV has long been implicated in essentialist discourses that produce cultural Others, primarily through a deficit lens. Similarly, the field of international development was founded upon a discursive binary between groups labeled “traditional” and an idealized portrait of Western modernity. Drawing on feminist and postcolonial scholarship, this study employed critical discourse analysis (CDA) to investigate how culture was constructed in 26 development research reports funded by international organizations that examined DV in Nepal. The analysis revealed that references to tradition and social change, and discourses of violence as endemic to place, sustained essentializing formulations of Nepali culture. Nevertheless, some passages in the documents inserted evidence that unsettled this essentialist narrative. These findings suggest that researchers, policymakers, and practitioners should develop a reflexive anti-essentialist stance, promote collaboration and leadership in research by diverse stakeholders in developing countries, seek to understand local strategies and resources that are being used to address social problems such as DV, and document the impacts of recent and transnational processes on social problems within developing countries.

Funder

National Insitute of Health and Institute of Translational Health Sciences, University of Washington

Publisher

SAGE Publications

Subject

Social Sciences (miscellaneous),Gender Studies

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