Abstract
This paper uses crowdsourced data on women’s self-reports of harassment and assault on public buses in India. The data provide a basis to identify the strategies that women use to respond to and manage this everyday threat. The study examines 137 accounts of assault collected by a crowdsourced platform in which women detail, keeping silent (n = 27), fleeing (n = 38), or resisting (n = 72) such an assault. Findings show that confronting incidents in the moment by “making a scene” and “engaging the crowd” works well in the closed, shared-space setting of a crowded public bus. The study concludes by asserting crowdmapping as a multi-faceted tool: it can allow women to be aware of potentially dangerous locales, empowers them to report incidents to help keep others safe, and provides a source of data to advise on best practices for navigating street harassment and assault in public buses.
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Lea, S.G., D’Silva, E. & Asok, A. Women’s strategies addressing sexual harassment and assault on public buses: an analysis of crowdsourced data. Crime Prev Community Saf 19, 227–239 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41300-017-0028-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41300-017-0028-1