LANGUAGE LAB

The perpetration of violence and abuse is a human rights violation. All people, families and communities are worthy of dignity, respect and safety.

Welcome to the Language Lab which centres the importance of how meaning matters, how talk, silences, and the choice and control to access information and communicate in language matters.

Explore more about how meaning matters. This link opens the content in a lightbox in full screen.

Build on your understanding of how talk and silences matter. This link opens the talk and silences page.

Explore creating possibilities 'in language' to support victim-survivors' choice and control. This link opens the Our Actions 'Choice and Control' page.

MEANING MATTERS

Meaning Matters: Open the meaning matters lightbox in full screen by clicking on the first tile in the lightbox below - the pages will show in full screen.

Follow my meaning - Follow my meaning about what my world means to me. “Please follow my meaning to take seriously what matters to me. Please don’t make assumptions about me or make decisions for me without me. Our impact on each other, even in the smallest of ways, might be lasting and significant. Please use your access to power, safety and resource to make changes so that everyone matters. Every day. Today.” [Excerpt: Follow My Meaning] Before exploring this section of the Language Lab, we invite you to view Follow My Meaning (7:40 mins) [https://vimeo.com/968476618] Using your phone, you can scan the static QR Code to open the animation on the Responders Lab page, or view it on the next slide. www.insightexchange.net/responders-lab

"...I might know (or not know) my rights but not have the power, access to safety or resources to live these." [Excerpt: Follow My Meaning]

In this section the follow statements are set out with related insights and materials. 1. We live in a world where safety, power and resources are not equal or shared. (p6) 2. Meaning can never be fully represented in language or any other form. (p9) 3. Language about violence and abuse is not is not definitive or universal. (p12) 4. The choice and control to access information and communicate in language is not equal or shared. (p18) 5. Many victim-survivors of violence and abuse are silent or are silenced. (p20) 6. Our responses can never be neutral. (p24) 7. We have been responding all along. (p27) 8. Our use of language (and silences) can be helpful, unhelpful or harmful. (p30) 9. We have choice and control in how we use language and silences. (p35)

‘Just because meaning making, dignity, deliberation, resistance and the responses of others matters to all of us, this doesn’t mean we all have the same power, and access to safety and resources… The power to make decisions, to have options and to be protected and live in safety. The safety to be, belong, to live and lead your life, and to care for others. Where we have what we need to enact decisions and live safely in community.’ [Excerpt: Our Interactions]

‘…I am much more than the parts or the sum of any descriptions or assumptions. And there will always be much more that matters to me and going on for me than fits into words or is safe to reveal.’ [Excerpt: Follow My Meaning]

‘Global, national, state and territory definitions of domestic, family and sexualised violence and criminal codes vary, however violence and abuse is never acceptable in any community, family, institution, place or context.’ ‘Domestic and family violence may involve the perpetration of one or many forms of abuse which is threatening, abusive, violent, coercive or controlling; causing a person to live in fear and to be made to do things against their will.’ Explore ‘What is domestic and family violence?’ as one example: www.insightexchange.net/about-violence-and-abuse

The words we might use about violence and abuse vary in contexts for example; in policies, in the media, in business, in forms and assessments, in services and systems, at court, in our family, with friends, in intimacy, in print, in the workplace, in law and criminal codes - yet we are always making meaning.

The words we might use to describe different forms of violence, and different descriptions of violence, for example; ‘strangulation’), may vary – yet we are always making meaning. Examples: “He choked me”; “pressed me up against...”; “held me by the neck”; “squeezed my neck”; “hands around my neck”; “tied me up around the neck”; “throttled me”; “had me in a choke hold”; “sat/ lay on top of me/on my chest”; “pinned me down”; “held me around the chest and squeezed”; “covered my mouth with...”; “smothered me”; “gagged me”; [Excerpt: Strangulation module] www.insightexchange.net/strangulation

The words of others may be welcomed or unwanted – yet we are always making meaning. '...I told her that [he] had been having sex with me in my sleep and she said: 'That’s not ‘sex’. That’s rape.' At that point, I couldn’t go there. I couldn’t use that word.” Ní [Ref 2] [Excerpt: Intimate Dignity] www.insightexchange.net/my-dignity/

Everyone has a right to engage in a language, which is theirs. This is a basic and noted human right. The right to speak one's own language is recognised and protected under international human rights instruments and conventions.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), 1948 (Article 2 & 27) https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), 2007 (Article 13,14 & 16) https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2018/11/UNDRIP_E_web.pdf Article 13.1 - Indigenous peoples have the right to revitalize, use, develop and transmit to future generations their languages, oral traditions, philosophies, systems and literatures, and to designate and retain their own names for communities, places and persons. Article 14.1- Indigenous peoples have the right to establish and control their educational systems and institutions providing education in their own languages, in a manner appropriate to their cultural methods of teaching and learning. Article 16.1 - Indigenous peoples have the right to establish their own media in their own languages and to have access to all forms of non-indigenous media without discrimination.

'Talk' is a reflection resource designed to reveal and value the strategic considerations of victim-survivors when deciding if, when and how to tell someone about experiences of violence and abuse. We invite you to read the booklet Talk www.insightexchange.net/talk We invite you to explore more about talk and silences on the ‘Talk’ landing page. www.insightexchange.net/talk

SILENCE - "Less than 40 per cent of the women who experience violence seek help of any sort.” [UN Women]. TALK - "In the majority of countries with available data on this issue, among women who do seek help, most look to family and friends and very few look to formal institutions, such as police and health services. Fewer than 10 per cent of those seeking help reported to the police.” [UN Women]. SILENCED - Many victim-survivors are silenced by the violence and abuse used against them and by unhelpful and harmful responses in society, services and systems.

“There is no neutral standpoint from which to theorise the ‘problem’ of violence.” [Excerpt: Working with content] www.insightexchange.net/working-with-content “There is no fence to sit on.” [Excerpt: Quality Response Continuum] www.insightexchange.net/kits-guides-tools

‘Responses don’t ‘start’ when someone ‘tells’ us something. We have been responding all along (directly or indirectly) through our stance, our silence, our action or inaction about violence and abuse. We are responders even when nothing is told to us.’ [Excerpt: TALK] www.insightexchange.net/talk

“In the same way that responses don’t ‘start’ when someone ‘tells’ us something…. …Our responses don’t end when an interaction ends. If and how we create and use information is a response. Often, records are made about us – data, notes, personal information. If and when we make records as a responder, it is important to be aware of how we can build on safety, dignity and justice. Words matter in making meaning and play a part in the overall information and records we create about people.” [Excerpt: My Ecosystem Matters] We invite you to view My Ecosystem Matters (10:30mins) [https://vimeo.com/968481464] You can open the animation on the Responders Lab page or view it on the next slide.

‘Whatever our role… A victim-survivor might wonder… - Have you checked with me that the descriptions reflect what I want you to understand and take seriously? - Have you blamed me for what’s been done to me? - Have you noticed what I am having to do, not do, give up and go without? Whatever our role… A perpetrator might wonder… - Have I diverted or distracted you from focusing on my use of control, abuse and violence? - Have you noticed what I have done and am doing? - Have you made allowances for my actions? - Have you made me or others responsible for what’s going on?’ [Excerpt: My Ecosystem Matters]

“Language can be used in restrictive or liberating ways to: - conceal or reveal violence - obscure or reveal offender responsibility - conceal or reveal responses and resistance; and - blame or contest the blaming of victims.” Dr Linda Coates and Dr Allan Wade (2007), 'Language and Violence: Analysis of Four Discursive Operations', Journal of Family Violence, 22:511-522. Explore more in the ‘Masterclass on Language and Violence’ with Dr Linda Coates (90mins) (2018). [https://vimeo.com/304100792]