Rape Culture Continuum Activity

Abstract

This classroom activity introduces the concept of rape culture in a way that implicitly provides evidence through students’ own experiences and contributions. Students bring up different forms of sexual and gendered violence and harassment (SGVH) and discuss how to arrange them on a continuum from less to more egregious, highlighting the ways they are...

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Details

Subject Area(s):

Collective Behavior/Social Movements, Cultural Sociology, Race, Class and Gender, Sex and Gender, Sexualities, Social Change, Theory

Resource Type(s):

Class Activity

Class Level(s):

Any Level

Class Size(s):

Medium, Small

Usage Notes

I conduct this activity approximately a quarter to a third of the way into a given term; I try to place it early enough that it can support later conversations about culture, sexual violence, and public sociology, but make sure to give enough time beforehand to develop a comfort level with classmates, the material, and the discussion of difficult...

Learning Goals and Assessments

Learning Goal(s):

1. Be able to describe rape culture at both a simplified common usage level and a more complex scholarly level.
2. Be able to give examples of the connections between different types of sexual and gendered violence and harassment, especially how less egregious forms of violence normalize cultural ideologies that support and justify more egregious ones
3. Be able to recall some key themes and important distinctions in theorizing sexual and gendered violence and harassment.

Goal Assessment(s):

1. I find this activity too heavy and detailed to be given a specific assessment as immediate follow-up. Instead, on future quizzes, exams, or writing assignments, I ask students to address questions about rape culture, cultural ideologies and their impacts on social action, or the ways theory may be taken up in daily life.