Elisa Marino’s research while affiliated with University of Turin and other places

The EU FR Agency reported that LGBT people and heterosexual youth not conforming to stereotypical gender expressions and behaviour experience harassment, bullying and discrimination, facing in some cases violent physical attacks (FRA 2009, 2012); the victims may experience a strong disempowerment that leads to social isolation, psychological stress, reduction of self-esteem and coping strategies (Herek, 2009). The present 24 month project aims to integrate the experiences and best practice of 3 projects realized within the European Union’s FRC and DAPHNE III programme. The main goals of the project has been to increase the empowerment, using a P2P approach, of young LGBTQ people to protect themselves and their peers against violence and to create a safe space for these youths by working with various service providers increasing the awareness about homo/trans-phobic attitudes (Rollè, Brustia, Caldarera, 2014) and to highlight the issues of minority stress (Meyer, 1995), as recommended by the European Commission (2012/3). The intervention-research design of our project – funded by the European Commission under the Daphne III [JUST/2011-2012/DAP/AG/3059] aims at achieving progress in attaining the priority “Empowerment work at grass-roots level”, also through the involvement of local NGOs. Participants: young LGBTQ people (18yo-M 30yo), service providers and helping professionals of the nations of each partner. The used methodology has been P2P approach as a mean to achieve empowerment and knowledge through a three-steps programme: 1. Empowering young LGBTQ impacted, in some way, by homophobic or transphobic; 2. Training various types of helping professionals and service providers to increase knowledge of violence against young LGBTQ people, and skills necessary to work with them effectively; 3. Empowering some of LGBTQ people through training to become facilitators. The project involves 2 partners from IT, ES, SI, UK, IE, different countries with a different level of awareness on sexual identity, homo/trans-phobia, in order to enhance an improvement and harmonization of knowledge, technical skills and culture at a European level. All programmes have been evaluated with a quali-quantitative measures to highlight the process and the outcome of the programme

Homophobia, a phenomenon firmly rooted in intolerance, refers to negative attitudes towards homosexual individuals. Being a social and cultural phenomenon, the media can act as a tool to highlight changes in attitudes to LGBTQI reality. The aim of this paper is to analyse representations of homophobia by comparing articles published in two Italian daily newspapers: " La Repubblica " and " L'Unità ". The articles published in 2002 and 2012 were chosen in order to investigate the differences and determine whether there have been changes in the portrayal of this phenomenon in the media. Attention focused on the thematic section and the publishing format, the gender of the journalist and the font style used by the author to describe events. In 2002 16 articles appeared in " La Repubblica " , while the figure jumped to 246 in 2012, an increase of more than 900%. Between 2002 and 2012 there was a 31% increase in local articles. " L'Unità " featured 17 articles in 2002, as compared to 95 in 2012, a rise of over 400%. The interval between the two years selected saw the number of national articles decrease by 12%. Overall however, the remarkable increase in the total number of articles emphasises the impact on public opinion, and the larger amount of space dedicated to this issue probably indicates a greater degree of open-mindedness in the political and legislative fields. Cuvinte cheie: Homofobia, ziare, reprezentare în mass-media stereotip.

The media play has a leading role in the construction of public opinion, especially in relation to sensitive issues like Domestic Violence (DV). The aim of study is to point out how the DV is represented in 2 Italian-newspapers in the years 2002/12 - both are not politically aligned. Seven keywords have been used to point out the appropriate articles, after that two independent researchers categorized the keywords into: form and content. Is observed that there is an higher percentage of DV not denounced. The results show an increase in denunciation of articles from 2002 and 2012, and of women dealing with women was evident. The data point out a change in the conception of damage and the correlation between journalists gender and victims’ and perpetrators’ portraits. We also observed that there is a preference to generally explain the phenomenon rather than face deeply the problem.

Nel presente articolo gli Autori analizzano il fenomeno della violenza domestica (DV) e della violenza tra partner (IPV) in Italia e in Slovenia. In entrambi gli stati, negli ultimi 20 anni, si è assistito ad un processo di normalizzazione che ha portato le vittime, anche se in numero ancora esiguo, a ricercare l’aiuto di persone esperte. Dopo un’introduzione sui concetti di DV e IPV vengono presentati i dati ISTAT (2007), riferiti all’ultima indagine effettuata sul fenomeno, e quelli dell’indagine nazionale svolta in Slovenia (2010): sono inoltre riportati dati DV su donne con disabilità. Anche se negli ultimi anni le denunce sono in aumento, il "numero oscuro" di cui non si sa nulla sono una percentuale elevata: la DV e la IPV non sono un fatto privato bensì pubblico.

The media sector plays a crucial role in the representation of issues which are uncomfortable, reflecting and shaping public opinion: intimate partner violence (IPV) is one such issue (Lloyd & Ramon, 2013). The aim of study is to explore how IPV is represented in 2 Italian newspapers in the years 2002/12. Seven keywords have been used to point out the appropriate articles, after that two independent researchers categorized the keywords into: form and content. We focalized the analysis on the correlation between journalists gender and victims' and perpetrators' portraits. The results show an increase of articles, and a deeply change into the newspaper coverage of IPV, from 2002 and 2012.

The present work aims to examine the Italian scenario for what concerned gender stereotypes against women and, specifically, how they are reinforced and partially created by the media (Volpato, 2011; 2013). It's essential to analyze briefly the evolution of women's movement, particularly in the historic moment that goes from the '60s until today, characterized over time by different claims which have led to innovations in civil and social rights. After this first part, designed to provide a basis for a better understanding of the complexity of the phenomenon, the work goes into a part related to women's gender stereotypes, highlighting their pervasiveness. Since this is an extremely complex phenomenon, the focus was narrowed to two areas: the role of women within the family (and how the transformation of the couple has produced substantial changes in gender roles) and women seen as an object. Both roles assigned and self-assigned to women are also compared with the media representation to provide a broader picture of the phenomenon. Despite the progress made both from a social and legislative point of view, stereotypes against women are still present on the Italian scene, and the media seems that are using them in their favor, continuing to promote their spread and pervasiveness. Cuvinte cheie: sexism, stereotipurile de gen, de reprezentare media, campanie publicitari, rolul femeilor.