ความรุนแรงในครอบครัวกับการต่อรองตัวตนและความทุกข์ทนของผู้หญิงในเขตปกครองพิเศษอาเจะห์ ประเทศอินโดนีเซีย

Abstract

This thesis aims to understand the phenomenon of domestic violence against Aceh Muslim Wives as a result of social changes in a historical context that affects the transformation of gendered power relation discourse between husband and wife in households and society. The aforementioned shift causes the distillation which normalized domestic violence against women and condenses the culture of violence against women in the private sphere. The study applied ethnographic research by collecting data from the lived experiences of 13 women aged between 25 and 65 who have defined themselves as victims of domestic violence perpetrated by their husbands in Banda Aceh, Kabupaten Aceh Besar, and Kabupaten Aceh Utara. The ethnographic fieldwork was conducted from October 2014 to February 2017. The study shows that, firstly, macro-structural changes especially in terms of religion in a historical context related to power relations between husband and wife opened an opportunity to turn over the old value of gendered power relations between husband and wife and elevated males status over women. This increased male gender-based power over their wives unconditionally. Secondly, the social transition of Aceh due to politics in relation to the religion or the interpretation of the Islamic law regarding gendered power relations played a role in pushing women to the edge. This results in the function of the power of men working across, breakthrough and insert social classes and status, which underscore the importance of class and status were acting not as the main factors of understanding domestic violence against women. Lastly, the two aforementioned changes did not only give men more gendered power but also internalized women with the subjectivity as Aceh Muslim women. In negotiating the definition of women in marital relationships in Aceh, most women chose to identify themselves as Aceh Muslim Wives, although they held different definitions of wife in regard to violence. Therefore, divorce or getting out of a marital relationship did not necessarily mean that those women challenged patriarchy in their families. This was because the tradition in Aceh barely had an opportunity for women to define themselves outside the box, in which they had to rely on their husbands and family. With no way to define their freedom of gender, the women of Aceh remain dependent on their husbands and families to build their subjectivity whether it is during a relationship or after divorce. In the meantime, their own relatives or kinship were found to be the main factors that supported the women’s inferiority and most of them were likely to protect the men.