Voices from the Void: A Depth Psychological Reconceptualization of Sex Trafficking in Modern‐Day India

Abstract

Human trafficking is practiced in many countries throughout the world, and every year millions of women and children are bought, sold, and traded into commercial sexual and labor‐based slavery. Of these countries, India is one of the largest portals and destination grounds for the trafficking and sexual enslavement of women and children. Victims of trafficking live under the daily threat of their own torture, abuse, and death, and in most cases even the torture and murder of their families, should they try to escape their captors. It is the immeasurable fear used to manipulate these women and children that eclipses the abject poverty impelling their exile into the darkest shadows of human existence. Within this context, it becomes important to consider how healing which moves towards restoring humanity, authentic voice, and soul to those who have been stripped and silenced in this regard can begin. In my opinion, the realm of depth psychology is unique in its ability to hold the tension between substance and shadow as it impacts oppressed populations and the socio‐cultural philosophies that have perpetuated silence and margin.