April Virtual Display #2: Sexual Assault Awareness Month

Content warning: This post contains resources about sexual assault.

In 2000, April was officially declared Sexual Assault Awareness Month by the National Sexual Violence Resource Center (NSVRC). You can learn more about the movement to end sexual violence on the NSVRC website.

The focus for 2021 is “We Can Build Safe Online Spaces”:

• Practice Consent and Show Respect for Boundaries
• Identify Red Flags that Indicate Online Grooming
• Create Respectful Online Workspaces and Classrooms
• Support Survivors of Online Harassment and Abuse

Check out the PDF infographic or TXT version for more detail.

If you are in need of support, the Clark Counseling and Health Center provides free and low-cost physical and mental health appointments for students along with a variety of mental health and wellness resources. The Employee Assistance Plan (EAP) provides free counseling resources to employees.

Here are some library resources that may help raise your awareness:

• Video: This Changes Everything, while focused on climate change, looks at sexual assault as an impact.
• Ebook: Campus Sexual Assault: College Women Respond, “focuses attention on the post-sexual assault experiences of twenty-six college women, weaving together their narratives to show the women as individuals with the power to overcome these traumatic experiences.”
• Book: Shattering Silences: Strategies to Prevent Sexual Assault, Heal Survivors, and Bring Assailants to Justice, an “in-depth look at revolutionary new ways to handle sexual assaults.”
• Memoir: Ordinary Girls, “Jaquira Díaz writes of her challenging girlhood and triumphant coming of age, from her struggles with depression and sexual assault to Puerto Rico’s history of colonialism.”
• Ebook: Gender Identity, Sexual Orientation, and Sexual Assault: Challenging the Myths, “sexual orientation and gender identity influence how sexual assault is experienced, how it is perceived, and ultimately, how victims (and perpetrators) are treated by the criminal justice system.”
• Book: Mean, “a confident, funny, brassy book that takes the cost of sexual assault, racism, misogyny, and homophobia deadly seriously.”
• Ebook: Some Men: Feminist Allies in the Movement to End Violence Against Women, “What does it mean for men to join with women in preventing sexual assault and domestic violence?”