Family violence conference held at UOIT/DC joint campus

The University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) and Durham College (DC) recently hosted the Social Services Network’s fourth-annual Impact on Family Violence Conference: A South Asian Perspective (FVC 2014).

The two-day event connected the diverse South Asian community with key sectors involved in violence prevention and response, and featured workshops from previous years' conferences, as well as new presentations on forced marriage, femicide, sexual diversity, sexual violence and disabilities. Four hundred guests attended the conference, which received the support of more than 25 community partners. More than 65 agencies and groups were represented, including:

• police services
• policy makers
• professors
• shelter workers
• social service workers
• the deaf, deafened and hard-of-hearing community

The keynote speakers included:

• Dr. Yasmin Jiwani, Professor, Communications Studies, Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, who spoke on the topic of femicide reporting in the Canadian Press
• Aparna Bhattacharyya, Executive Director, Raksha, a non-profit organization for the South Asian community based in Atlanta, Georgia, who discussed the role cultural competency plays in assisting survivors of violence

"What a tremendous turnout to such an important event," said Dr. Nawal Ammar, Dean, Faculty of Social Science and Humanities. "Family violence is such a serious problem in any society, and the University of Ontario Institute of Technology is pleased to be a part of an event that brings its impact to light. Only through education and coming together can we put an end to family violence."

FVC 2014 is part of a five-year initiative developed to understand the specific nature, systems and complex cultural and family dynamics that pose barriers and challenges to preventing and responding to the abuse that occurs in South Asian families.

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