Tag Archives: criminal justice

Browne, A. (2004). Fear and the perception of alternatives: Asking “why battered women don’t leave” is the wrong question. In B. R. Price & N. J. Sokoloff (Eds.), The Criminal Justice System and Women: Offenders, Prisoners, Victims & Workers (3 ed., pp. 343-359). Boston: McGraw Hill.

1.      Main Thesis: Browne shows that there are differences not between battered women who kill their abusers and battered women who do not, but that there are differences between the abusers themselves. Among other variables, abusers who are killed by their victims are more likely to engage in child abuse and sexual assault of their partners; abusers who were killed were, in many ways, more violent and merciless than those who were not killed by their victims.

2.      Body of Evidence: Browne engages in a comparative study of battered women in two groups: those who killed their abusers (the homicide group) and those who did not (the comparison group). She interviewed these women, giving many answers to the question of why battered women don’t leave their abusers even as she problematizes the asking of that question in the first place. The interviews provide chilling case studies of the violence battered women rightly fear if they were to make an attempt to leave their abuser; Browne says that “at least 50 percent of women who leave their abusers are followed and seriously harassed or further attacked” (p. 344). The interviews contextualize the complexity of a battering situation for a woman who fears danger to those she loves, be they adult protectors, children, or pets. The interviews also show how difficult it is practically to leave an abuser when a woman must be present/predictable for court proceedings, child custody arrangements, employment, and more. Finally, Browne uncovers a correlation between the reactions of abused women and the reactions of those who have been victims of other types of trauma, such as natural disaster victims. In all, Browne finds seven variables that increase the likelihood of an abuser being killed: 1) frequency of abuse 2) severity of victim’s injuries 3) frequency of sexual assault 4) abuser’s drug use 5) abuser’s alcohol use 6) abuser’s threats to kill and 7) victims’ suicide threats.

3.      Conclusions: Browne argues that asking why battered women don’t leave is the wrong question because battered women usually act in reaction to their abusers. She concludes by using social judgment theory to show that women who kill their abusers have been pushed outside their latitude of acceptance by their abusers’ actions.

4.      My Conclusions: This article deeply changed the way I think about battering situations. I have asked the question, “Why doesn’t she just leave?” I did not know that most abusers will follow and harass a woman who leaves. I did not know that police so often dismiss the allegations of battered women. I did not think about the implications of a woman’s actions for those she loves, including her children and anyone who shelters her. I did not consider the practical consequences of leaving for a woman who has likely been systematically isolated by her abuser; she often has no means of economic support and may not have the resources to obtain gainful employment. This article overwhelmingly supported Browne’s main point that abusers’ actions drive the actions of victims. Since reading this article, I’ve had numerous conversations  about why battered women don’t leave. I hope that, with this new understanding, I can change others’ thinking as well.

Ferro, C., Cermele, J., & Saltzman, A. (2008). Current perceptions of marital rape: Some good and not-so-good news. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 23, 764-779.

1.      Main Thesis: Ferro, Cermele, and Saltzman conducted a study that found that current college students and college alumni do not endorse rape myths at high levels. However, their study does show that victim-rapist relationship significantly affects perception of the crime.

2.      Body of Evidence: The authors conducted an Internet-based survey of 85 undergraduate students at and 44 alumni of a small liberal arts college. They randomly provided each participant with a vignette depicting either a marital rape or an acquaintance rape scenario. They then used the Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance Scale to assess the participants’ acceptance of rape myths and the Rape-Supportive Attributions Scale and the Sex-Role Stereotypical Victim Blame Attributions Scale to assess false beliefs about rape and level of blame attributed to the victim, respectively. The authors were specifically seeking any differences in the responses of participants based on participant sex and participant cohort (that is, whether they were current students or alumni). The authors found that perceptions of rape were more realistic than expected; participants were not very supportive of rape myths and were sympathetic toward victims (p. 772). However, victim-rapist relationships significantly affected how participants thought about rape. The study showed that “support for false beliefs is greater for participants who read about marital rape than for those who read about acquaintance rape” (p. 773). In addition, the authors found that, as expected, men were more likely to support rape myths than women. However, the authors’ hypothesis that the older cohort would be more supportive of rape myths proved to be untrue.

3.      Conclusions: The authors found that participants’ support of rape myths was fairly low, but also that the relationship between victim and rapist significantly affects how people understand rape. In other words, people (male and female equally as mentioned on p. 775) are still unsure of how to assess blame in situations where the victim and offender are in a romantic relationship (as in marital rape). In addition, the assumption that younger generations are more aware in regard to sexual assault may not be true. The authors call for increased research on the “development and maintenance of rape myths” in order to discover how overall support of rape myths can be low while sexual assaults are high (p. 777).

4.      My Conclusions: I was impressed by the detail of this study as well as the authors’ careful explication of the limitations of their work. For example, they note that these results cannot necessarily be extended to noncollege populations; they even acknowledge the limited work that has been done on noncollege populations in this area in general. The authors also addressed a limitation that I think is particularly important: that “participants’ responses may be driven by their need to provide socially acceptable answers” (p. 777). There is really no way to (ethically) control for this, and I think it is a significant limitation—perhaps one that would have deserved a little more attention if the scope of this article had been larger. However, the authors explicitly state that this study is about attitudes toward rape. Using their analysis of such attitudes, they point to a discrepancy between attitude and behavior and highlight it as an area for future study. I think this is a smart and responsible course of action, and this unique empirical study is an excellent contribution to knowledge about social understandings of rape.

Owen, B. (1998). The mix: The culture of imprisoned women. In In the Mix: Struggle and survival in a women’s prison (pp. 167-192). Albany: State University of New York Press.

1.      Main Thesis: Owen works to describe and understand a cultural community in a women’s prison by focusing on three areas: negotiating the prison world by acquiring “juice,” styles of doing time such as adherence to prison code, and involvement in trouble or “the mix.”  Owen suggests that criminologists have a social justice obligation to study these communities and women’s ways of surviving in prison because incarceration “affects a disproportionate number of women of color and those marginalized” in other ways (192). This is a beginning point for conversations about how public policy constructs these women’s lives.

2.      Body of Evidence: Owen observed prisoners at Central California Women’s Facility in order to gain access to a complex prison culture. This article is framed around three main areas that shape the lives of prisoners at CCWF: “negotiating the prison world, which involves dimensions of ‘juice,’ respect, and reputation; styles of doing time, which include a commitment to the prison code; and one’s involvement in trouble, hustles, conflicts and drugs, known as ‘the mix’” (167). Negotiating the prison world involves prison smarts (described as knowing how to get things done), recognizing relationships with the staff, and mentor-style relationships. Styles of doing time refers to adherence to the convict code, which is a concept imported from male prisons that occurs roughly along generational lines; Owen found significant disapproval toward the younger generation because they “are rude, disrespectful, and inconsiderate” (177). Finally, women prisoners’ lives are shaped by participation in, or refusal to participate in, “the mix,” which is “any behavior that can bring trouble and conflict with staff and other prisoners” (179). Owen discusses the drug mix, the homosexual mix, and the fighting mix. The drug mix is characterized as unstable, the homosexual mix is a “place of trouble,” and the fighting mix overlaps both (184). All these layers make up a complex prison culture that shapes women’s lives at CCWF.

3.      Conclusions: Although most of the women at CCWF express a desire to stay out of trouble and ultimately “survive the mix,” Owens shows that the cultural forces she describes necessarily impact their lives (188). She emphasizes the “damage of imprisonment” and its immediate negative effects (189). Owens includes several comments from prisoners who found prison time to be beneficial in some ways, but she concludes by suggesting that descriptions of prison life may help those outside to consider the obstacles women like those at CCWF have to face in their lives both inside and outside of prison.

4.      My Conclusions: This chapter was a very detailed ethnography-style study, but I was confused by Owens’s conclusion and methods. Although she seems to support a course of action that requires readers to conceive CCWF as a destructive place, most of the women’s comments in the conclusion seem to frame it as a rehabilitative space, at least compared to their lives outside. In addition, I was unsure of how the prisoners’ comments were obtained, since it sometimes seemed that they were having a conversation and sometimes seemed they were being interviewed. It would have been helpful to have this context. I suspect that these issues make more sense in the larger context of the book that this chapter appears in. In sum, then, I really appreciated Owen’s project to help those who have never seen the inside of a prison understand what it might be like to try to survive in a prison culture.