Rhian Keyse

SHaME Postdoctoral Fellow Dr Rhian Keyse discusses the recent U.S. Supreme Court leaked draft opinion, its ahistorical logic, and its implications for abortion rights in the U.S.

The SHaME Project team and WOW celebrated the launch of the Shameless! Festival with a reception featuring HRH the Duchess of Cornwall. During her address, the Duchess conveyed the importance of changing the culture of shame surrounding survivors of sexual violence. The festival will take place on November 27th at the Battersea Arts Centre.

Dr Rhian Keyse's project explores the evolution of (post)colonial and international medico-legal responses to rape and sexual violence in Anglophone Africa, c.1920-1985, with particular focuses on Kenya and Ghana. It seeks to understand how international, colonial, and postcolonial legal, medical, and psychiatric structures have impacted on survivors of sexual violence; to recover the experiences of complainants as they navigated medical and legal structures, as well as the role of medical personnel in identifying and prosecuting sexual violence; and to examine how shifting ideas of governance, development, anti-colonialism and rights influenced debates and responses to sexual violence on African continent.