The Centre for Research into Violence and Abuse (CRiVA) was launched in 2013 and has since been designing and enhancing research-led education, policy and practice in the field of violence and abuse.
Ayurshi Dutt has been part of CRiVA since 2019 when she started her PhD at the Department of Sociology.
Read on to find out more about Ayurshi, her role and passion and why CRiVA is so important.
Tell us about your role within CRiVA
I have had an active role in organising and chairing seminars in relation to my area of expertise. I was also an enthusiastic ‘CRiVA volunteer’ – a role which entailed working on the CRiVA newsletters, organising the Centre’s mailing list, and more broadly promoting the work of the Centre on social media platforms. I feel like I am in a safe space of academics who ensure growth opportunities for younger members of staff. At present, I am a Teaching Fellow in the Department of Sociology teaching Criminology modules.
What is your research specialism?
My area of research relates to violence against racially minoritised women and I am most interested in the patterns and motives of perpetration of forced marriage, as experienced by British South Asian women.
Why are you so passionate about the Centre and the work they do?
I have plenty of memories at CRiVA from an early career researcher point of view. I still remember going along to one of the first CRiVA meetings where all of us were cooped up in the corner of a coffee shop on a misty winter morning. I remember the camaraderie I saw among senior academics, academics I had only read on paper before. I was putting faces to their names in awe of each one of them and the new PhD students’ energy in the room.
Since then, I have collaborated with a number of CRiVA members on different occasions and that is something which has reinforced my passion in the work we do as a Centre. Colleagues are supportive about staff and students’ research interests and never mind when someone picks their brain. I only receive a bunch of links and papers when I nerd a topic out with my colleagues at CRiVA and you can’t put a price on that. It is very inspiring when all of us come together in a room and unpack our struggles with writing, exchange feedback, discuss publication opportunities and our pedagogical approaches to teaching – all of which are essential and ongoing for early career researchers.
How does your work impact communities / the world around you?
The work that I do affects all of us – it affects the public understanding of forced marriage, debunks cultural frameworks often associated with it, gets students thinking about how it is an offshoot of coercive control in the context of family, and makes us have a harder look at the support available for victims and survivors. There is diversity of forced marriage experiences and my work shows that. It impacts police officers, frontline workers, practitioners and third sector organizations in identifying and responding to this form of violence. I promote my research on podcasts and small-scale organisations working to support racially minoritised victims of domestic violence. I also make active efforts to make my work visible for the wider South Asian communities and occasionally speak about it on community radio channels.
Find out more
- Ayurshi Dutt is a Teaching Fellow in the Department of Sociology. Visit her profile
- The Centre for Research into Violence and Abuse (CRiVA) is dedicated to improving knowledge about interpersonal violence and abuse, and professional and societal responses to it. Find out more
- CRiVA’s research has received international acclaim and led to ‘world leading’ and ‘internationally excellent’ impact ratings. Discover more
- Our Department of Sociology is ranked 1st in the UK for Criminology and 3rd in the UK for Sociology in The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2024. Feeling inspired? Visit our Sociology webpages to learn more about studying with us.
- If you’d like to share your story or insights into your work, visit our Submit a blog or vlog page to learn more.