Violence against Women

This is an edited volume of 12 articles previously published inSocial Problems that may be considered among the most influential in the development of the sociological study of violence against women.

Research and advocacy aimed at understanding and ending violence against women had its beginning in the early 1970s, emerging as a central concern of the feminist movement. This work has expanded exponentially over the past three decades to influence practice and policy at the local, state, and federal levels. Many of the most influential articles in the field were published in Social Problems. This volume assembles twelve of these articles into a core text that covers such topics as wife abuse, sexual assault, sexual harassment, and stalking as well as institutional response to violence against women.

Chapter 1 Introduction: The Emergence of Violence against Women as a Social Problem
Part 2 Part I: Forms of Violence against Women
Chapter 3 "Riding the Bull at Gilley's": Convicted Rapists Describe the Rewards of Rape
Chapter 4 The Myth of Sexual Symmetry in Marital Violence
Chapter 5 Safe Conduct: Women, Crime, and Self in Public Places
Chapter 6 On Being Stalked
Chapter 7 The Locker Room and the Dorm Room: Workplace Norms and the Boundaries of Sexual Harassment in Magazine Editing
Part 8 Part II: Institutional Responses to Violence against Women
Chapter 9 Prosecutorial Justifications for Sexual Assault Case Rejection: Guarding the "Gateway to Justice"
Chapter 10 Gender, Accounts, and Rape Processing Work
Chapter 11 Policing Woman Battering
Chapter 12 Emergency Department Responses to Battered Women: Resistance to Medicalization
Chapter 13 The Social Construction of Deviance: Experts on Battered Women
Part 14 Part III: Feminist Activism and Social Change
Chapter 15 The Battered Woman Movement and the Creation of the Wife Beating Problem
Chapter 16 Identity, Strategy, and Feminist Politics: Clemency for Battered Women Who Kill