Why doesn't she just leave?: Belonging, disruption and domestic violence

From the 1970s, a feminist response to domestic violence in Australia was to assist women to leave their homes to escape domestic violence. In doing so, women's (and their children's) lives and their belongingness to place and to family were disrupted. Indeed, discourses about domestic violence assumed that women's lives would be disrupted. More recently, in Australia, legal and other reforms have allowed for the greater possibility of a woman remaining safely in her own home (and her violent partner being removed) and retaining some sense, at least, of her belonging to place. However, further significant policy and attitudinal change is required. In this article, I explore the gap between the experiences of women and the policies and legislation that have been in place to provide assistance and protection, and how this has changed over the past three decades. In particular, I examine what it means to leave home or to at stay home in relation to domestic violence and I consider what they mean in terms of belonging to family and to place.