ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the West two prevailing narratives of rape are currently available for women attempting to tell of their experiences of being raped. The negating of a woman's rape experience is informed and supported by dominant discourses of heterosex the experience is storied as typical of sexual relations and she is positioned as a passive recipient of a mans natural sexual advances. The discourse of individualism prevails in neoliberal societies, where individual agency is glorified and we applaud those who achieve success by avoiding, or effectively navigating their way through, risk or challenge. The trauma of rape narrative offered an important counter-story to directly contest the negating and blaming assertions of the master narrative and its destructive positioning for women. The chapter illustrates the strategies women used to disrupt the harmful or otherwise limiting narratives available to them and asserts alternative framings of their rape experiences, considers implications of such counter-storying in women's efforts toward living well.
