Structures for care and silenced topics: accomplishing gender-based violence prevention education in a primary school

Abstract

Little is known about the conditions that enable teachers to educate others about the troubling issue of gender-based violence. This paper discusses the centrality of structures for care for fostering the willingness and capacity of primary school teachers to initiate classroom talk about this sensitive and silenced issue. Drawing on interviews conducted over 3 years with five teachers and two leaders in a primary school in a culturally and religiously diverse community in Melbourne, Australia, barriers to teaching about gender diversity, gender-based violence and family violence are discussed. This includes teachers’ and leaders’ anxiety about triggering distress and fears about parental ba..