Abstract

The research that supports this text aims to contribute to the problematization and a methodological proposal about violence against women in the public space from a gender perspective. It will be sought to contribute knowledge about the perception of women regarding experiences of street sexual harassment in intermediate cities in Maule Region, Chile. According to the theoretical discussion, street sexual harassment is considered as violence against women, which may contain a physical, psychological, sexual and symbolic dimension. In turn, this phenomenon is manifested in various territories, which have a physical / spatial dimension, symbolic and a particular cultural matrix that characterizes them. In this context, the intersection of street sexual harassment and territory would allow us to investigate the specificity of harassment in the territories of the Maule and eventually be able to make subsequent comparisons with other investigations that have developed the same problem in other regions of Latin America. Finally, a qualitative exploratory study was proposed, aimed at characterizing the perceptions about street sexual harassment that woman between 18 and 34 years, belonging to the provincial capitals of the Region of Maule. For the development of the research we used information gathered through focus groups and in-depth interviews, and the results of the analysis will be discussed in the light of multidisciplinary theoretical contributions developed from a gender perspective.