An exploration of black women students’ sexual experiences

A research report submitted in fulfilment of the partial requirements for the degree of Master of Arts at the University of the Witwatersrand. Department of Political Studies, 2018In this research report, I critique the use of consent as a standard for differentiating between harmful/unacceptable and harmless/acceptable sexual experiences. Central to my investigation are the relationship between consent and power. Using material from interviews I conducted with eight Black women situated at Wits University, I analyze three main issues. I first analyze the political implications of emotion, arguing for a recognition of the role emotion plays in regards to sexual consenting practice. I then discuss the connection between bodies and language in discourses on sex, gender, sexuality and violence. I explore this through two frames: first, how Black women’s bodies are read through a sexualizing lens and then, through an exploration of the possibilities of communicating consent through non-verbal language. Thirdly, I look at the complexity of meaning making practices, pertaining to experiences of unwanted sex. I make the argument that consent models of understanding sexual violence are inadequate, due to the way they conflate desire and consent, as well as consent and harmlessness. I also make an argument for prioritizing women’s understandings of their sexual experiences, over legal understandings of these experiencesXL201