Purpose: Studies on sexual health following male child sexual abuse (CSA) have identified the negative effects of such experienceson body functioning, but little is known about male CSA survivors’ ability to create emotional and physical closenessin romantic relationships. The purpose of this article is to explore how male CSA survivors perceive, experience and developintimacy in romantic relationships, including both the challenges they face and the positive changes that enable them to growand achieve healthy relationships.

Method: The study has employed a qualitative research approach and is based on in-depth interviews conducted among adultmale CSA survivors residing in Sweden. Participants were recruited through civil society organizations and an ad in a dailynewspaper. Using reflexive thematic analysis, the results are presented in relation to two themes: (a) challenges of intimacy;and (b) building trust and close relationships.

Results: The results show that participants desired couple relationships that included both sexual and emotional intimacy.The challenges of intimacy were related to compromised sexual identity, sexual dysfunctions and compulsions, emotionaldysregulation, and body shame. Efforts to achieve intimacy were facilitated by disclosing abuse experiences, developingemotional bonds or awareness, embracing sensitivity, and having an empathetic and supportive partner.

Conclusions: Reconstructions of abuse histories were both challenged and facilitated by the accessibility of various and shiftingideas about masculinities that co-exist in Sweden, which were important sources for meaning making and assisted themen in developing positive valuations of themselves as men.

Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, social workers at battered women's shelters and night shelters and church deacons in Sweden warned that they were at risk of losing contact with their clients. Thus, even though Sweden was never subject to a lockdown in 2020 or 2021, many of the signals from the social workers indicated that their lost clients were at risk of increased ill health, mental illness, and violence due to the situation produced by the pandemic. The aim of this chapter is to develop a theoretical and empirical understanding of this vulnerable position that was imposed on these client groups by the COVID-19 pandemic. These developments also created fear and worry among the social workers themselves, when it became clear to them that they were at risk of losing contact with their clients. Therefore, the concept of shared trauma is used to focus on the way in which care workers are exposed to similar impacts of collective traumatic events as their clients. From the start of the project in March 2020, a total of 25 different civil society organisations have been followed through short telephone interviews. The method is inspired by rapid ethnographies.

This study explores how social work professionals at women’s shelters in Sweden experience, understand, and are responding to domestic violence under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. A qualitative longitudinal research design was employed, and multiple semi-structured interviews were conducted with 14 professionals at women’s shelters over a period of one year. The results are presented in three overall themes; (a) professional challenges due to increased needs, (b) professionals’ adjustments to new circumstances, and (c) professionals’ attributions regarding client barriers to help seeking. The results show diverse and changing experiences among the professionals as the pandemic progressed. Clients and professionals have shared the same collective trauma associated with the pandemic, which has affected the professionals’ understanding of and response to domestic violence. The professionals understand both clients and themselves as being more vulnerable and susceptible to risk under these new circumstances. Social work adjustments focused on maintaining contact, reducing risk and prioritizing safety, which had both positive and negative consequences for both clients and professionals. The study concludes that the professionals coped with the uncertainty they experienced during the pandemic by relying on both their previous knowledge and work experience of domestic violence and their experience of sharing trauma with clients.

När covid-19-pandemin nådde Sverige mobiliserade kvinnojourerna snabbt eftersom de visste vad en nedstängning av samhället skulle kunna betyda för kvinnor och barn som lever under hot och med våld i sina hem. På kort tid kom myndigheternas rekommendationer om att arbeta hemma, upprätthålla social distans och undvika resor att minska möjligheterna till rörlighet. Detta gjorde det särskilt svårt för kvinnor som levde under hot och kontroll att komma i kontakt med myndigheter och kvinnojourer. Syftet med denna artikel är att förstå hur relationen mellan samhället och kvinnor som är utsatta för hot och våld i hemmet under pandemitider ser ut. Analysen utgår från en teoretisk modell för ”det immunitära livet”, för att förstå förhållandet mellan individ och samhälle. Studien består av telefonintervjuer som genomfördes våren 2020 med personal vid fem olika kvinnojourer. Ett viktigt resultat i studien är att misshandlade kvinnor under pandemin riskerar att berövas möjligheterna att skapa viktiga relationer med samhället, något som exempelvis kvinnojourer annars möjliggör.

When the Covid-19 pandemic reached Sweden, women’s shelters mobilized quickly because they knew what a lockdown of public life could mean for women and children who are living with threats and violence in their homes. In a short time, recommendations by the authorities to work at home, maintain social distancing, and avoid travelling resulted in decreased possibilities for mobility. This made it particularly difficult for abused and controlled women to make contacts with the authorities and women’s shelters. The purpose of this article is to understand how the relationship between abused women and the community can be understood in times of pandemic . This is done by applying a theoretical model of ”the immunitary life”, to understand the relation between the individual and the community. The study consists of telephone interviews conducted in the spring of 2020 with staff at five different women’s shelters. A central result in the study is that abused women, during the pandemic, are at risk of being deprived of opportunities to create the relationships with the community that women’s shelters otherwise enables.

Child sexual abuse can have long-term impact on the survivors’ emotional, physical, and psychological wellbeing. Male survivors of sexual abuse are less likely to disclose and report their experience compared to females because of aspects related to male gender socialisation. Feelings of shame, guilt or confusion about sexual or masculine identity silence sexually abused men. They report difficulties in both seeking and receiving formal support services tailored to their specific needs. This article presents collaborative work performed by an anthropologist and a psychotherapist during therapy of adult men with a history of sexual abuse. By using certain tools of ethnography in narrative therapy, we developed culture- and gender-sensitive conversations with sexually abused male clients from diverse backgrounds. A case study is provided to demonstrate how we worked with the various stages and practices of ethnography and narrative therapy, focusing on how sexually abused men were invited to unpack the discourses of masculinity that influenced their ways of understanding themselves and their traumatic past. The article offers an example of how anthropological knowledge and methods can be applied in contexts of clinical social work and demonstrates the way that postmodernist and constructive therapies combined with the tools of ethnography can generate constructive conversations about gender for sexually abused men

In recent years, the sexual assault of males has received growing attention both in the research literature and among the public. Much of the research has focused on documenting prevalence rates or the psychological consequences of male sexual assault. However, this article aims to understand how men, as gendered, embodied and affective subjects, make sense of their experiences of sexual assault. In-depth interviews with ten adult males who have experienced sexual assault have been analyzed using a phenomenological approach in order to learn more about their lived and gendered experience. Four themes emerged from the analysis: (a) conflicting feelings and difficult conceptualizations, (b) re-experiencing vulnerability, (c) emotional responses and resistance, and (d) disclosure and creativity. The findings suggest that the ways in which men navigate norms of masculinity shape the way they understand, process and articulate their lived experience of sexual assault. As a way of coping with the experience and of healing from a past that is still present, the study participants perform an alternative masculine identity.

Utgångspunkten är en presentation av sex forskare, knutna till Centrum för sexologi och sexualitetsstudier, som berättar om sina respektive forskningsfält. Utställningen består också av en tidslinje med nedslag i den svenska sexualitetshistorien, ett tittskåp med kuriosa och en samling litteratur. I en brevlåda kan besökaren kommentera eller ställa frågor till forskarna, svaren projiceras på väggen. Två offentliga samtal arrangeras och filmas; Sex och makt och Tema erotisk litteratur. I samband med utställningen visas konstprojektet "Kyss" där prästen och konstnären Kent Wisti och författaren Maria Küchen i bild och text tolkat Höga visan.

The core of the exhibition is a presentation of six researchers, linked to the Center for Sexology and Sexual Studies, presenting their respective fields of research. The exhibition also consists of a timeline with stops in Swedish sexuality history, a curiosity cabinet and a collection of literature. The visitors can leave comments or ask questions to the researchers in a mailbox. The questions and the answers are then projected on the wall for everyone to see. Two public talks are held and filmed; “Sex and Power” and “Theme Erotic Literature”. The art project "Kiss" (an interpretation of the song of Songs) by the priest and artist Kent Wisti and the author Maria Küchen can also be seen in the exhibition.