The geographies of sexual violence in education: a photovoice study in and around a South African township secondary school

ABSTRACT This paper centers on the voices of adolescent school children to examine the geographies of sexual violence in a South African township secondary school. In doing so, I analyze data generated through photovoice to show how school children identified and described school-related geographies of sexual violence. Using their visual artifacts, adolescents identified certain spaces as ‘hotspots’ for sexual violence, and these spaces, in turn, shaped the nature and forms of this violence. Drawing on these findings, the article highlights how adolescents conceptualize school-related geographies of sexual violence, and how in these geographies, this violence occurred. Within this context, the paper calls attention to the intersection of childhood sociocultural geographies and children’s experiences of sexual violence.