AWARE and the Juneau Violence Prevention Coalition will be teaming up in June with national organization Men Stopping Violence to host Alaska Men Stopping Violence, a series of trainings focused on violence intervention and prevention in small communities.
“This is a new thing for us to do,” said Lily Larsen, Men and Boys programming manager at AWARE. “We are looking at how we can engage the men in our community to use these prevention and intervention strategies.”
Larsen said AWARE has been inspired by the trainings done by Men Stopping Violence and thought it would be a great program to bring to Alaska on the issues of gender-based violence, sexual assault and abuse.
“We will be using some curriculum from Men Stopping Violence, but this is really about community training and involvement,” Larsen said. “How the community can get involved and hold men accountable and make it safer for victims.”
The trainings will also involve discussion of the intersectionality of sexism and racism.
“We’ll be working on prevention and intervention, but we’ll also be talking about re-thinking issues of gender and how we define masculinity,” Larsen said.
These trainings will be hosted June 19-20 at the Elizabeth Peratrovich building between 8:30 a.m and 4:30 p.m. The first session, “Mobilizing Men to Prevent Violence Against Women: A Comprehensive and Community Centered Approach,” will be held June 19-20. The second session, “Men at Work: Intervening with Men Who Use Violence,” will be held June 20-21.
“The first session will focus on prevention and the second session will focus on intervention techniques,” Larsen said.
Larsen emphasized that these trainings are open to anyone.
“We are really seeking to engage men in this work,” she said. “Women have been really involved in the work we’ve done around domestic violence and sexual assault and women will certainly be attending the training, but we’re hoping to have men there and working with the men in our community.”
These sessions were organized through a collaboration of AWARE (Aiding Women in Abuse and Rape Emergencies), JVPC, Men Stopping Violence and the Central Council Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska. Registration is available at http://juneauviolencepreventioncoalition.org/.
• Erin Granger is an intern for the Juneau Empire. Contact her at eringranger93@gmail.com.
