Biography

Janine Markram has completed her Master’s in Psychology. Her thesis was titled : “A Qualitative Study Exploring Female University Students’ Experiences of Sexual Harassment.” Within the South African context, gender violence and sexual harassment have become ‘normalised’ to the extent where many women live in fear of being violated in many different ways. Many accounts of sexual harassment shed light on what the victim has done to initiate the harassment and what they could have done to prevent it from occurring. This has created a culture of victim-blaming where the victims experience repeated victimisation and a serious need to address the complex layers of women’s experiences. The aim of her study was to explore female Stellenbosch University postgraduate students’ narrations of their experiences of sexual harassment that occur within the campus environment. The participants narrated complexities around naming/labeling their experiences as sexual harassment and the severity thereof – drawing on dominant discourses and cultural meanings to position themselves in different ways. With the distribution of this study’s results to Stellenbosch University, her hope was to increase the safety for students at risk of becoming sexually harassed and create a campus environment where women feel safe and comfortable enough to come forth and speak about their experiences.

Supervisor: Dr Samantha van Schalkwyk

Email: janinemarkram1992@outlook.com Contact: +27 21 808 4032