Research Proposal for Final BA Dissertation. Research Proposal

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Introduction
Nowadays, domestic abuse especially against women has become widespread in American society despite the tireless efforts of the US government, media companies, and non-profit organizations in preventing the increasing rate of such cases, helping victims to recover and spreading awareness. These efforts are established and founded by the integration of political, social, and institutional systems along with an economic culture that is all prevalent in the US. The objectives of these various organizations in the society mostly revolves around the issue of violence against women, which is to inform and spread awareness to the public, protect the vulnerable population in these cases, and prevent the further continuance of this crime. However, despite having a common goal towards violence against women, the gathered data still shows contrasting results wherein at least one in four women have experienced domestic abuse throughout their life in the US, sexual assaults cases of women are recorded to reach up to 500 cases per day, and approximately about 53 percent of all murdered American women were shot to death by their intimate partners and/or family members ().
Assault between males and females remained unnoticed and unacknowledged in a society less than 40 years ago. However, at present, several programs and movements are now giving more focus and importance to these “intimate intrusions” with the emergence of various forms of media, not only limited to television programs and newspaper articles, campaigns for public awareness, social science studies, and university courses (Stanko, 1985).
With these circumstances in mind, the assessment of tackling how this ongoing issue of domestic abuse and violence against women is crucial. It is important to note if this being addressed by the state, local, and national levels via various organizations that lead the fight against this issue. There are still increasing reports of such violence disseminated through the news, the media, and social networking sites.
The main research questions to be addressed in this paper are:
1 How do various forms of organizations and institutions, including the government and other non-profit organizations, disseminate assistance and aid to the vulnerable population of domestic violence, particularly women?
2 What are the communication strategies used by the mass media in portraying domestic violence?
3 How policies are being delivered in helping the victims of these violent acts?
Literature Review
Domestic abuse
As defined by Womensaid.org.uk, domestic abuse is defined as a gendered crime wherein incident or pattern of incidents arose from control, coercion, threatening, degrading and violent behavior of the partner, or ex-partner, or even by a family member. This can include coercive control, psychological/emotional abuse, physical/sexual abuse, financial/economic abuse, digital abuse, and harassment, and stalking.
This crime is deeply rooted due to the societal inequality among men and women and is very common with women as victims, perpetrated by men. Domestic abuse happens to any woman regardless of their ethnicity, race, religion, class, or sexuality. Considered as a horrible crime, domestic abuse can lead to families and children suffering from its long-term and shattering effects. It can take various forms of abuse which occur in a broad spectrum of domestic environments (, n.d.)
Feminist perspective on domestic violence
A fundamental definition of violence against women using the feminist approach is central to the idea that domestic abuse, as perpetrated mostly by men, is the abuse and misuse of control and power, especially in a society ran by patriarchs where men are depicted to possess more control and power over their families and in the society, in general. To support the notion that domestic abuse is driven by the misuse and abuse of power and not necessarily by gender, domestic abuse in relationships among lesbian and gays as well as cases of men being assaulted and abused by women has been recently recognized. Moreover, the social construction of how masculinities and femininities belonging to a certain social group and/or culture which contributes to gendered violence is another approach used by postmodern feminists (Weedon, 1987). The position of prominent discourses in defining gender and violence as influenced socially and culturally along with ways of how violence is being interpreted and responded by people is also given emphasis (Bagshaw & Chung, 2000).
In this new millennium, the change in the patriarchal society has been observed wherein women have emerged to be strong and independent, as compared to their depiction in the previous centuries. In general, feminists advocate the rights of women in various aspects of daily life which include but not limited to economics, politics, and culture. During the second wave of feminism, feminists have attempted to end the control and power held by men in this patriarchal society, providing a difference for “all women”, if not, majority. In the 1960s, Valk claims that “US women began to organize a political movement to improve their economic, political, and social status and the opportunities available to them” (Valk, 2002, p. 306). In the 1920s, the gaining of voting rights for women is a significant event in history, depicting progress for feminists. However, it can still be noted that feminism is not inclusive of all women, particularly drawing attention to the needs of women of color. Women, who are claiming to be feminists, in general, would fall into an established structure of powers which is led by White women, as observed politically, socially, legally, and generally.
The role of media in domestic violence
According to Gillespie et al (2013), the role of news media in communicating and disseminating information about social issues is significant in molding the perception of the society, particularly in cases of domestic violence (Gillespie et al., 2013, p. 222). This includes the responsibility of integrating all aspects to show different sides of the story in portraying the issues to the public deliberately. This is crucial as the decisions of the public is influenced mainly by how the media depicts the issue in question. In addition to this, as a prepackaged social construction, media frames are considered to function maturely as a template in which a certain social event can be understood (Gillespie et al, 2013, p. 226)....