美国国家公共电台 NPR Finding Strength In Shared Stories Of Childhood Sexual Abuse

 

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

Today - difficult memories from a religious reform school in Louisiana. It was called New Bethany Home for Girls. And during the 30 years that it was open, law enforcement a number of times investigated claims of child abuse at the school.

Joanna Wright arrived there at the age of 16. She says she was sexually assaulted as a child beginning at the age of 7. She hoped the school would be an escape for her. But when she got there, she says the man who ran the school raped¹ her. She thought she was the only one until years later when she met others who also claimed they were physically² and psychologically abused by the same man. Tara Cummings was one of them. They spoke³ at StoryCorps. Joanna begins.

JOANNA WRIGHT: I thought something was really wrong with me, that I must be a really bad person because this keeps happening to me in life. I started to think how could I dismember my body and spread the pieces around so that God couldn't find me and put me back together to punish me.

TARA CUMMINGS: I used to wish that I would come back as a cotton ball or a Coke can, completely inanimate so I could feel nothing. Who was the first person that you told?

WRIGHT: My father.

CUMMINGS: What did he do?

WRIGHT: Had me take a lie detector⁴ test. I always wondered, what do people see in me that makes them think it's OK to abuse me? And that was something that I carried even into adulthood⁵. I wonder what I would have been like. I think I would have been a free spirit, but it put a fear in me that I I've never shaken. I don't know that I ever will. You know, I always thought there has to be other girls I can't be the only one. And so I've always blabbed about it, but you managed to keep it a secret. And I guess I wondered why.

CUMMINGS: I was a really good liar⁶. Always being the preacher's kid and putting on a perfect front, I think I was trying to move on. But to get out of the hiding was a game changer for me, and I learned that from you. I know you don't believe in divine path, but I was at a fork in the road, and knowing you has changed my life.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

MARTIN: Tara Cummings with Joanna Wright in Cypress⁷, Texas. In 2014, a group of women, including Joanna and Tara, came forward to say the school's founder⁸ raped and abused them - a claim he denied. The next year, a grand jury did not indict⁹ him, and he died the following month. Joanna and Tara's story will be archived at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress and featured on the StoryCorps podcast.

1 raped   

v.以暴力夺取，强夺( rape的过去式和过去分词 )；强奸

参考例句：

• A young woman was brutally raped in her own home. 一名年轻女子在自己家中惨遭强暴。 来自辞典例句
• We got stick together, or we will be having our women raped. 我们得团结一致，不然我们的妻女就会遭到蹂躏。 来自辞典例句

2 physically   

adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律

参考例句：

• He was out of sorts physically,as well as disordered mentally.他浑身不舒服，心绪也很乱。
• Every time I think about it I feel physically sick.一想起那件事我就感到极恶心。

3 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

4 detector   

n.发觉者，探测器

参考例句：

• The detector is housed in a streamlined cylindrical container.探测器安装在流线型圆柱形容器内。
• Please walk through the metal detector.请走过金属检测器。

5 adulthood   

n.成年，成人期

参考例句：

• Some infantile actions survive into adulthood.某些婴儿期的行为一直保持到成年期。
• Few people nowadays are able to maintain friendships into adulthood.如今很少有人能将友谊维持到成年。

6 liar   

n.说谎的人

参考例句：

• I know you for a thief and a liar!我算认识你了，一个又偷又骗的家伙！
• She was wrongly labelled a liar.她被错误地扣上说谎者的帽子。

7 cypress   

n.柏树

参考例句：

• The towering pine and cypress trees defy frost and snow.松柏参天傲霜雪。
• The pine and the cypress remain green all the year round.苍松翠柏，常绿不凋。

8 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。

9 indict   

v.起诉，控告，指控

参考例句：

• You can't indict whole people for the crudeness of a few.您不能因少数人的粗暴行为就控诉整个民族。
• I can indict you for abducting high school student.我可以告你诱拐中学生。