Protecting our Borders
As we consider ‘what matters’ to those of us engaged in working with people around experiences of violence, it is no longer possible to focus narrowly on a particular localised category of violence understanding. In our view, this is primarily because the territory of violence discourse appears to have changed in recent years.
We have noticed a shift towards understandings of violence that are ‘integrated’ (Kelly 2000, Tomison 2000), with consequent changes to service delivery and practice. More recently we have noticed global experiences and understanding of violence have been more present in our lives and in those with whom we work.
For example, there seem to be more war metaphors used in our conversation; talk about ‘good’ versus ‘evil’, and preoccupation with borders, safety and protection…