Silencing state-sponsored rape in and beyond a transnational Guatemalan community

Although rape by soldiers occurred frequently during the recent civil war in Guatemala, rape survivors' own accounts have been excluded from public testimonials of state violence. It is commonly assumed that cultural ideologies that blame and stigmatize rape victims are responsible for the underreporting of rape in war. Based on ethnographic research in a transnational Guatemalan community, this article challenges the claim that local culture silences survivors of state-sponsored rape. Rather, it demonstrates the ways national and international forces collude in the depoliticization of rape and the silencing of rape survivors.