The University of Central Florida’s Victim Services will have its semi-annual Clothesline Project on display in the Student Union during the month of April, which is Sexual Violence Awareness month.
The Clothesline Project is a program started on Cape Cod, Mass., in 1990 to address the issue of violence against women. The project incorporates color-coded t-shirts that each represents a different crime of violence towards women or children. Students and members of the community are invited to share their experiences and empowering statements on a t-shirt for the project.
“What we do is we offer them to anyone who’s been a victim of crime, violence or abuse, their family members or friends,” said Christey Oberbeck, a Victims Advocate within Victim Services and organizer of the project. “It’s their opportunity to say whatever they want. It’s their opportunity to voice things they probably haven’t voiced before. And we put them up.”
The shirts are uncensored, and victims/survivors are welcome to put whatever they feel best expresses their experience. This semester’s Clothesline Project uses cotton t-shirts, while the project showcased in the John C. Hitt Library last October were paper cut-outs.
Victim Services intern Kiara Montero-Reyes, a sophomore sociology major, had wanted to be apart of the project since first seeing the display her freshman year.
“I like how we use this shirt representation because you don’t know who is behind it,” Montero-Reyes said. “It doesn’t matter where they came from, how old they are, what their race is, what gender they are – these shirts just represent an experience that people went through and how they rose above it or are rising above it.”
“[Sexual violence] impacts everybody,” said Oberbeck. “Some of the things that are put on the shirts, you can look at them and you can tell who’s been impacted. And reading those is like, whoa.”
The shirts will be displayed in the atrium of the Student Union April 1 through 30.
“In the end, what we’re trying to show is that even though you may have had a violent time in your life, you can always come back from it,” said Montero-Reyes. “It’s nice to know that there are other people supporting you.”
If you or someone you know is struggling with victimization, please contact Victim Services via their 24/7 hotline at (407) 823-1200.
