Combating Sexual Violence in the Ivy League: Reflections on Politics, Pain, and Progress

• In Event: 75.060 - Roundtable Session 33
  In Roundtable Session: 75.060-5 - The Politics and Policy of Responding to the Crisis of Campus Sexual Violence

Abstract

Objectives or purposes: In this presentation, the author explores the historical and ideological specificities of the effort to combat sexual violence in the Ivy League. After serving as a leader on the issue for ten years at both (institutional names removed for blind review) Colleges, she provides a unique ‘insider’s’ perspective on the challenges and opportunities inherent in creating and advancing the work of sexual violence at two of America’s most revered colleges.

Perspective(s) or theoretical framework: The author’s experiences as a student affairs practitioner working to prevent and respond to sexual violence happening at two different Ivy League campuses, (institutional names removed for blind review), have been heavily influenced by her stance as a critical educator. In this presentation, she will demonstrate how the policies, practices, and political nuances of executing meaningful sexual assault prevention efforts has implications beyond these two institutions on college campuses nationwide. She will connect these revelations to how she came to understand how the overwhelming weight of the social culture paralyzed survivors, and reified the masculinist culture for which these institutions are known (Grey, 1994; Reeves-Sanday, 1992).

Methods, techniques, or modes of inquiry: The author draws upon ten years of direct experience combating sexual violence at (institutional names removed for blind review) Colleges to inform this analysis. As a critical educator, her analysis includes attention to interrogating and deconstructing the power dynamics that suffuse all institutions, but particularly those heavily populated with elites. Because elite institutions have disproportionate influence on the practices and policies found more broadly in higher education, her presentation will focus on how these institutions 'set the stage' for complicity with silencing survivors, and how they also gave birth to an active movement of resistance against this silencing.

Data sources, evidence, objects, materials: Data for this presentation include notes, journal entries, recollections of conversations and events, and student newspaper clippings from both institutions, which the author used to construct her memories of the ten years she spent combating sexual violence at this institution. These artifacts are woven within and throughout the presentation, providing structure and context to the assertions she makes about these institutions and their practices during the early 21st century.

Results and/or substantiated conclusions: The author’s story of combating sexual assault at (institutional names removed for blind review) is a tale that is both revelatory and cautionary. Both the promising practices adopted, and harmful actions taken, are interwoven to form a complex narrative about privilege, power, and progress in the Ivy League, and about what lies ahead in our continuing effort to end rape in the halls of all colleges, vaunted and ordinary alike.

Scientific or scholarly significance: As a faculty member who transitioned to this role after 17 years in student affairs, the author is uniquely positioned to use her experiences and insights to tell the truth about, and shape the field of sexual violence prevention going forward, and to engage others in dialogue about the barriers that exist to ending rape on campus.

Author

• Susan Marine, Merrimack College