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Walking the Beauty Path
faces, voices, words of survivors
This means redefining 'normal' and what that is in our society.
One way of doing that is through cultural phenomenons like the Vagina Monologues. This play takes taboo subjects and transforms them into a beautiful experience of empowerment and art. It has been described as "incredibly intimate and amazingly universal". Part of it's power is the use of language to describe experiences around the reality of being female and sexuality. It also explores themes of sexual abuse without a sense of shame. You can rent it at most movie rental stores. Other sources of normalcy for survivor issues are survivor music (such as Tori Amos) and participating in women's week events like the clothesline project. You can also explore personal survivor sites.
Message board support groups are a huge part of the online survivor community. They are empowering places for survivors to help one another find their healing path.
Survivor movies:
Vagina Monologues Official website
http://www.vaginamonologues.com/index.html
The Vagina Monologues- Contains moving feminist perspectives on rape in war torn countries as well as our attitudes towards our own bodies. Many college campuses put on annual Theater presentations of this play during women's week in April. Available at most movie rental centers.
Searching for Angela Shelton - The movie
http://www.searchingforangelashelton.com/
"In “Searching for Angela Shelton,” filmmaker Angela Shelton journeys across the United States to meet other Angela Sheltons and through them survey women in America. What she wasn’t prepared for was to learn that like herself, 24 out of the 40 Angela Sheltons she spoke to had been raped, beaten or molested. The first Angela Shelton the filmmaker meets rents out space to a foster care company and it brings up the filmmaker’s memories of being in a foster home as a child. Then there is an Angela Shelton who tracks sexual predators and just happens to live in the same town as the filmmaker’s father who molested her and her stepsiblings for years."
Music:
http://www.toriamos.com/
According to Wilson Web Biography Reference Bank:
"Amos helped launch RAINN, the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network, in 1994, shortly after she received a Visionary Award from the D.C. Rape Crisis Center for addressing the issue of sexual assault in her music. She also helped to establish a toll-free sex-abuse hotline" Current Biography (1998)
She is also the inspiration for many rape survivor websites and online support groups.
"The song "Me and a Gun" from the album Little Earthquakes is inspired by a real event in Tori's life, an event refered to as a rape in some interviews, and a sexual assault in others."* |Quotes|Quotes on rape| Inspiration to survivors|Biography|Everything Tori|Piece by piece- biography|Music|MusicII|
http://www.voicesofstrength.org/
"Survivor and Founder Haullie Free takes 15 courageous Survivors of Rape, Sexual Abuse and Domestic Violence on a journey toward personal enlightenment and self validation, through the power of the human VOICE."
Many of the participants in this project are members of several Tori Amos inspired survivor support groups.
Cathartic songs for rape and sexual abuse survivors, II
http://www.survivingthememories.com/id71.html
http://www.inthefray.com/200109/image/
http://www.strongattheheart.com/
"people who survived everything from adolescent and childhood rape to incest, sexual assault and molestation. In healing, they found unexpected strengths. They've chosen to tell their stories and be photographed for [this] book, STRONG AT THE HEART, so that you can see how real teens and adults heal from sexual trauma."
http://www.myspace.com/lavenderpowersisters
Personal Rape Survivor Websites
The survivor community exists largely online in the form of personal sites and support Message boards.
http://welcometobarbados.org/
Welcome to Barbados is a Tori
Amos inspired site for rape and sexual abuse survivors. This site is particularly
visually appealing and well developed.
http://escapinghades.pandys.org/
A rape and sexual abuse survivors site. This site was created by one of the founders of the message board pandora's aquarium.
"In Greek Mythology, Persephone is the goddess of spring. According to her story, she was abducted, raped and taken to the underworld by Hades, the lord of the underworld. When her mother, Demeter, found out what had happened to Persephone, she convinced Zeus to force Hades to release her. Before Persephone could leave, Hades made her eat a pomegranate, which meant that she would have to return to the underworld for one-third of the year. According to the legend, the time Persephone spends in the underworld is the time in which there is winter on the earth. Because Persephone made it out of the underworld, she can be called the first rape survivor. As rape survivors we can take comfort from the knowledge that although winter is hard, there is always spring around the corner."
http://www.pandys.org/aphroditewounded/
Aphrodite Wounded is a support site for women who have experienced rape/sexual assault in marriage or by another male partner
http://www.survivingtothriving.org/
An upbeat site for survivors of sexual assault. This is a site for female and male survivors of sexual violence, including rape, attempted rape, sexual abuse and incest as well as the people who support them. In these pages, you will find my story and the stories of other rape and sexual assault survivors who have chosen to share theirs, as well as information, including pages on healing, medical and legal information for rape and sexual assault survivors, and sections for child sexual abuse and male survivors.
http://www.survivingthememories.com/
This is a great personal site with a page on music for survivors. You can listen to many of the songs from the site. It also has a good menu of survivor issues.
http://www.pandys.org/overtherainbow/
An interesting site based on the Wizard of Oz theme. The author does research on rape in the media as well.
http://www.prevent-abuse-now.com/sitemap.htm
A well organized site with research as well as crisis information on victim's services oriented around child sexual assault.
https://www.angelfire.com/or/emergence/
Welcome to Emergence is another attractive site adorned with Pre-Raphaelite art works. It is an homage to Tori Amos (founder of RAINN) as well.
"I hope that somehow, at sometime, someone else finds a piece of their own strength and determination, and sees in the mirror their own beautiful reflection.”
http://www.dancinginthedarkness.com/
This is a great survivor site which is connected to the message board 'After the Silence'.
http://www.findingmyvoice.net/
"I found my voice when I spoke to other survivors; I found the strength to share my stories, my experiences, my feelings and my aftermath. I found my voice in being honest about my past and how it has affected me, in helping other survivors feel less alone, and in telling my friends and family these stories, my stories which are a part of me and my life."
http://www.aswaterspassingby.org/
A very well organized and interesting personal survivor site which describes message boards, how to use them and notable survivors.
A
directory of rape crisis syndrome resources and community links from Pandora's
Aquarium
Abrahams, N. (1996). Negotiating power, identity, family, and community: Women's community participation. Gender & Society, 10(6), pp. 768-796.
"Women's community participation re(creates) community and identity. In this article the author explores the collective identities that are built around motherhood, rape-crisis work, Latino empowerment, and political activism for 39 Anglo and 11 Latina women."
Kurtz, Nathania Jayne (2006). Rape Work: Victims, Gender, and Emotions in Organization and Community Context. (Review of: Martin, P. Y.) Affilia, 21 ( 3), pp. 354-355.
