
Institutional Courage and Dreamstorming: From Campus Sexual Violence and Cultural Betrayal to Transformational Change at Universities
All Conference Event
Theme: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging
Friday, 1/17/2025
4:30 PM - 6:00 PM
America North Ballroom - Westin
Open to All
Presenter(s)
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Jennifer Gomez
, Boston University
Approved Continuing Education Credit(s): APA, CSAEd Core, CSAEd - SJI, NASW, NBCC
Abstract
Dr. Gómez will frame this plenary address within her book, The Cultural Betrayal of Black Women & Girls: A Black Feminist Approach to Healing from Sexual Abuse. First, she will provide a basic primer on structural racism and intersectional oppression, including how each is related to society’s understanding of violence. She then will detail her research with cultural betrayal trauma theory, which she created as a Black feminist scientific framework for examining the unique cultural betrayal harm of within-group violence in marginalized communities, including specifically Black male perpetrated sexual abuse against Black women. With this research as the foundation, Dr. Gómez will shift to focusing on transformational institutional change at universities. First, she will provide specific institutionally courageous steps for how universities can transform into more peaceful and equitable spaces that benefit Black women survivors and others. Next, Dr. Gómez will detail two examples for promoting transformational change at the university. In the first example, she will discuss her advocacy in the high-profile cultural betrayal gang rape case from University of Oregon (UO; 2014-15). In this case, the director of the university counseling center—a licensed clinical psychologist—seized the therapy records of Jane Doe, who had filed a Title IX lawsuit against UO. The director of the university counseling center then provided those records to General Counsel without the knowledge or consent of Jane Doe or her therapist, ostensibly to be used against Jane Doe in the lawsuit. Dr. Gómez’ role as a then-doctoral student included writing to the state ethics board for psychology, demanding that the clinical psychologists involved be held accountable. Next, Dr. Gómez will share a detailed hypothetical case of institutional betrayal at the university from her book. In this hypothetical example, she will discuss a Black man professor’s cultural betrayal sexual harassment of Black women graduate students, which includes institutional betrayal in both his behavior and the university response to it. She will then describe what an institutionally courageous response to this situation would have been. Finally, she will end with dreamstorming: If the world, including this university, were fully and completely equitable and peaceful, what would that look like? And how do we get there?
Learning Outcomes- Define three primary aspects of cultural betrayal trauma theory: (intra)cultural trust, cultural betrayal trauma, and cultural outcomes.
- Define institutional courage and describe institutional courage steps from the three classes: operations, assessments, and reparations.
- Define dreamstorming and describe its usefulness in addressing, and ultimately eliminating, campus sexual violence at universities.