IMPACT Chicago: Researchers Seeking Reflections from Sexual Assault Survivors on Donald Trump.

From researchers Katherine Bogen and Lindsay Orchowski
We invite your reflections for an essay in the upcoming book Trumpism: The Politics of Gender in a Post-Propitious America, to be published by Cambridge Scholars in 2018, eds. Laura Finley, PhD and Matt Johnson, MA. We have approval from the Editors of this volume to prepare an essay which creates a space for sexual violence survivors to respond and react to the campaign, election, and presidency of Donald J. Trump. We envision that this essay will create a space that illustrates the ways in which survivors of sexual violence respond to and understand the candidacy, election and presidency of Donald Trump.

We are hoping to gather responses from survivors of sexual violence (who are currently over the age of 18) that reflect on one or more of the prompts listed below. We define sexual violence broadly, to reflect any sexual act (completed or attempted) committed against someone without that person's freely given consent, at any point in the lifespan.

Specifically:

1. How has the candidacy, election, and presidency of Donald J. Trump made you feel?

2. How has experiencing sexual violence shaped your reaction to the candidacy, election, and presidency of Donald J. Trump?

3. If you have found yourself feeling emotionally or psychologically impacted by Donald J. Trump’s candidacy, election, and presidency, how have you been able to cope with your reactions? Which coping mechanisms have been particularly effective?

4. What was the experience of writing about your emotions relating to the candidacy, election, and presidency of Donald J. Trump in relation to experiences of sexual violence like for you?

5. What recommendations would you have for other survivors of sexual violence in responding to the candidacy, election and presidency of Donald J. Trump?

Contributors may choose to respond to one or more of the prompts. Responses are limited to 2000 characters per question.

Responses can be submitted anonymously via the following link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/TrumpSurvivorNarratives

Individuals who prefer to submit their responses via email can send a word document (.doc or .docx format) to: TrumpSurvivorNarratives@gmail.com.

As Editors, we will prepare an introduction for the essay. The anonymous responses to the aforementioned prompts will follow. Names or other forms of identifying information will not be attached to the reflections. We do invite individuals to identify the personal characteristics (i.e., age, occupation, gender, etc.) that they would like to accompany their responses. We will also prepare a conclusion to the essay. Please note that although it is our intention to include all submitted survivor responses in the essay, the Editors of the essay will maintain the right to screen out inappropriate submissions.

To reflect the participatory nature of this essay, we invite individuals who would like to be named as an author of this essay to contact us TrumpSurvivorNarratives@gmail.com. In this role, individuals will have the opportunity to comment on the draft, and will be included on the list of authors. Please also note that our IRB Board considers the responses to the above questions to be a form of journalism (i.e., exempt from IRB review/approval).

We thank you for taking the time to consider this request, and share this opportunity with others. We request that contributions be received by June 10th. We hope that this piece will reflect the collective power and voice of sexual violence survivors, as well as create a space for a group of survivors to engage in an empowering political discourse.

Sincerely,

Katherine Bogen, BA and Lindsay Orchowski, PhD

Katherine W. Bogen

Senior Clinical Research Assistant

Rhode Island Hospital: Department of Psychiatry

146 West River Street, Suite 1L, Providence, RI 02904

Phone: (401) 444-7067

Fax: (401) 444-2570

Email: Katherine.Bogen@lifespan.org

Lindsay M. Orchowski, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor (Research)

Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior