Sofie Henze-Pedersen

Short presentation

In my PhD project "After the Violence? Children at women's refuge" I investigate intimate family relations from a child’s perspective among children at a women’s refuge. Every year approximately 2.000 children in Denmark spend time at a women’s refuge after being exposed to domestic violence in their home. However, we lack knowledge of how children “do” family in difficult situation – in this case in the context of domestic violence, and after moving to a women’s refuge. Especially, we lack knowledge of the child’s relationship to the father who is left behind. Based on ethnographic fieldwork and qualitative interviews this project contributes with unique theoretical and empirical knowledge of how children navigate and practice intimate family relations during and after a stay at a women’s refuge.

I am partly located at the Department of Sociology, and partly at VIVE - The Danish Center for Social Science Research.