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‘Colour of Violence’ project aims at positioning racialized survivors at the center of anti-violence work

BWSS’s Colour of Violence project will explore the extent to which gender and race influence systemic responses to gender-based violence. Image courtesy of BWSS.
James Mainguy - CFRO - Vancouver • BC | 18-11-2021
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Over the past year, Battered Women Support Services (BWSS) saw a near doubling of requests for services.

Partly in response to this spike, as well as in response to BC’s upcoming anti-racism legislation, BWSS has begun a multi-year project called “Colour of Violence” that will examine violence against racialized women.

BWSS's Executive Director Angela Marie MacDougall spoke with CFRO about the need to “look at the systemic, institutional, and historic underpinnings of violence.”

'Colour of Violence' also, "aim to challenge the homogenization of 'women of colour' and tend to the specific experiences of Black, Indigenous, migrant/refugee, and women and gender diverse survivors of colour," MacDougall said.

The project will take several years to complete with the ultimate goal of “changing behaviors…in terms of how the system responds to survivors,” adds MacDougall.

Listen to the CFRO interview below:

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