Aggression, Control and the Roots of Violence

Aggression, Control and the Roots of Violence: Understanding Masculinity and Power from a Sociological Perspective

Aggression, Control and the Roots of Violence: Understanding Masculinity and Power from a Sociological Perspective.

A sociological lecture for practice, prevention, and professional reflection.

Presented by Dr Jamila Rosdahl

Date: Wednesday 15 April 2025

Time: 6:00pm - 7:30pm AEST

Delivery Modes: Sydney Campus and Online

Location: ACAP Sydney Campus - 255 Elizabeth Street Sydney

Level 1 Lecture Theatre (Please use escalator from Elizabeth Street main entrance)

Aggression, Control and the Roots of Violence: Understanding Masculinity and Power from a Sociological Perspective.

The ongoing prevalence of aggression, coercive control, and domestic and family violence in Australia has intensified public concern about violence, and underscored the need for effective approaches to prevention and intervention. Practitioners are increasingly expected to respond to these harms while navigating complex institutional, relational, and ethical demands, often without shared language for understanding the gendered power relations that underpin them. In this presentation Dr Jamilla Rosdahl offers a sociological analysis of contemporary violence, situating acts of violence within broader systems of patriarchy, masculinity, and power. Drawing on the work of key social thinkers including Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, Hartmut Rosa, Henry Giroux, and Slavoj Žižek, the session examines how dominant constructions of masculinity, processes of discipline and normalisation, and experiences of alienation and loss of meaning, shape men’s relationships to control, aggression, and violence.

Grounded in Dr Rosdahl’s professional experience in violence prevention and working with men who have used violence, including within Scandinavian prison-based intervention programs, the session explores international approaches that explicitly name masculinity and patriarchy as conditions of change rather than topics to avoid. Particular attention is given to how men can and do take responsibility for disrupting violence, and to the social and institutional conditions that support meaningful transformation. Participants are invited to develop a deeper sociological orientation to aggression and violence that enhances ethical engagement, critical reflection, and sustained prevention across individual, relational, and structural levels.

About the Presenter.

Dr Jamilla Rosdahl is a sociologist, violence expert, and gender equity research officer for Unions NSW, specialising in gender, coercive and social control, stalking, surveillance and violence, as well as critical criminology, social philosophy and political thought. Dr Rosdahl currently teaches social psychology, environmental and postcolonial sociology, social policy, social work, and classic and late-modern social theory with a focus on feminist, post-colonial, and Foucauldian thought. She was Associate Professor at Karlstads University (KaU), taught at The University of the Sunshine Coast, and worked for the Queensland Research Centre for Domestic and Family Violence, Central Queensland University (CQU) and with the NSW Government. In 2018 Dr Rosdahl worked for the Swedish Prison and Probation Service in the areas of male sexual violence crimes.

Attendance.

If an attendee is Sydney based, we would love to see you on campus. For those not in Sydney, we will broadcast the session live via zoom. A link to the presentation will be sent the morning of the event and again later in the day, for any late registrants. Please note that if the zoom link is not in your Inbox to please check your junk folder or other sub-folders.

Please note: Professional Development certificates will only be issued to attendees with an 80% attendance; this is to uphold the integrity of the event and presenter.