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For women who have experienced sexual violence, to tell another person is both a considered and a compulsive decision. Many women never tell, yet, within our therapeutic culture, it is thought imperative that women recount their stories of abuse in order to heal and become socially responsible. Not only does the act of sexual abuse violently fragment identity, but the process of recovery through speech concerns the purposeful transformation of identity from victim to survivor, albeit always associated with the original act of violence. It is the speech act, the storying of the incident, that is transformative. The moment of telling therefore represents a dynamic and socially situated event which can, within the context of therapeutic discourse, powerfully transform the agentic speaker into a victim or a survivor. This article explores this moment of telling stories of sexual violence, focusing on two women's accounts which arose as part of a long-term ethnographic study within a feminist voluntary organisation working with women who have experienced sexual violence. The point of recognition in this interpersonal and socially situated transformation into victimhood is explored, to highlight instances of resistance and to trouble the discourse of psychological harm. In so doing the binary of victim/survivor is contested as a useful categorisation of those who have experienced sexual violence. In concentrating on this specific moment of telling, it is suggested that identity is constructed continually and so, although this article is necessarily focused, extrapolations to the wider field of education can be made.

This article explores the debate surrounding the SlutWalk events in the United Kingdom between April and July 2011 by reviewing relevant newspaper articles, blogs and websites. Additional material and insight was drawn from an ongoing three-year ethnographic research study in a feminist voluntary organisation which supports women who have experienced sexual violence, where dialogue about SlutWalk with staff and service users (emotionally and practically connected to the debate) was recorded. The troubling of SlutWalk, a particular political action of third-wave feminism with an ambiguous relationship with earlier forms, is considered in relation to feminist and wider debates. Accepting a position of ambivalence reflects a more personal engagement with these debates, which acknowledges the author's own theoretical transformation and praxis. The development of a more fluid theoretical toolkit allows for critical examination of ambiguities and complexities, whilst retaining a political praxis in which inequality is articulated. SlutWalk provides a context in which these ambivalences can be explored. This article therefore critically reflects on post-feminist developments, identifying differences and continuities with more traditional feminist debates, to highlight the complexity of this worldwide collective public action.

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