Citation

Taylor J, Cheers B, Weetra C, Gentle I. Aust. Social Work 2004; 57(1): 71-83.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2004, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1111/j.0312-407X.2003.00115.x

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Competing discourses have always figured prominently in policy debates about violence against women and children. Legislation and services to address it have largely been developed from theory and empirical knowledge of domestic violence occurring in intimate relationships. Knowledge from an Indigenous perspective about family violence, embedded in a context of colonisation and involving a broader range of relationships, has been less influential. One of the consequences of this is that when Indigenous communities identify solutions to address family violence holistically, these solutions are difficult to implement. Research with a remote South Australian Aboriginal community, looking for ways to reduce the level of family violence, resulted in new understandings of it. Linking issues of economic deprivation, dispossession and the breaking down of culture, the community devised a holistic community development approach to reduce family violence.