In this five-hour workshop Clare Murphy will break away from convenient stereotypical understandings of male perpetrators and female victims of intimate partner violence. Clare draws from her own research and international in-depth studies with male perpetrators and female victims.

Male Perpetrators: Clare will unearth the complex attitudes and ways men’s masculinities are practiced differently depending on the context. Research shows many male perpetrators of intimate partner violence do in fact have pro-social skills and abilities – and reveals desires for caring relationships amongst men – and for lifelong, loving, close relationships with women. Understanding multiple sides of men’s stories is imperative for preventing abuse and coercive control of women.

Female victims: Women cope with coercive control in multiple ways, but this is not well understood by outsiders because the media misinforms the public and many DV workers lack the time to reflect on the complexities of women’s incredibly clever coping strategies. Clare will deepen your understanding of the multiple ways women cope with living with a man who abuses, restricts, violates and controls her.

BIO — About Dr Clare Murphy, PhD:
Clare Murphy has worked in the domestic violence field for 16 years as a researcher, counsellor, community educator and she supervises professionals from different countries, working in the domestic violence sector. Clare is from Dunedin and currently lives in Brisbane. In the 1990s Clare ran protected women’s programmes at HAIP in Hamilton and latterly ran anger management for women programmes at NHLWV in Auckland. Since 2009 Clare has being blogging her research on her website that speaks out loud about coercive control and psychological abuse speakoutloud.net. Clare’s PhD research entailed interviewing male perpetrators of intimate partner abuse and her Masters researched entailed interviews with women who had lived with a partner who coercively controlled her but never used physical violence.

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