"Body theology has for some time challenged the way in which traditional theology views bodies, and in this way it has moved the incarnational discourse forward. However, it has rarely taken a long look at some of the harsher realities of the body and the ways in which bodies manifest and react in a world that places huge pressure on humans. The authors in this book argue that the battered and bruised, mutilated and self-mutilating bodies of women act as a violent hermeneutical clue to the way in which female bodies simply are sites of societal, ecclesiastical and psychological warfare. As liberation theologians, the editors and contributors do not accept the arguments for the responsibility of victims or the naturalizing rhetoric of violence against bodies. Instead, they prefer to ask questions about structures of violence, the construction of women's bodies and the implications that the conjunction of the two have in the lived realities of women's lives."--Jacket.