“This Society Ignores Our Victimization”: Understanding the Experiences of Korean Male Victims of Intimate Partner Violence

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is defined as physical, psychological, and sexual violence that occurs in an intimate relationship. For the victims, it often leads to devastating consequences such as physical injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Research on IPV has been extensively conducted for several decades. However, most studies have focused on male-to-female perpetration, and men’s victimization has been relatively neglected. This study aims to explore men’s IPV experiences within the context of Korean society, which is characterized by strong gender norms that may impede efforts to understand how men are victimized. Eleven Korean male IPV victims participated in semi-structured phone or in-person interviews lasting 1 to 2 hr, all of which were audio-recorded and transcribed. The transcriptions were qualitatively analyzed using a phenomenological method suggested by Giorgi. In total, six themes were revealed in the data: (a) living with violence, (b) enduring the violent relationship, (c) feeling helpless, (d) ending the relationship, (e) suffering from trauma, and (f) perceiving male victimization in society. Our findings are meaningful in terms of demonstrating how masculinity in one society can shape the thoughts, emotions, reactions, and behaviors of male victims. These findings can be used to tailor outreach efforts and interventions to the unique experiences of Korean men.

Sexualization of Female Perpetration in Fictional Holocaust Films: A Case Study of The Reader (2008)

The publication of Bernhard Schlink’s novel The Reader (1995) sparked conversation and controversy about sexuality, female perpetrators and the complexity of guilt regarding the Holocaust. The screen adaptation of the book (Daldry 2008) amplified these discussions on an international scale. Fictional Holocaust films have a history of being met with skepticism or even reject on the one hand and great acclaim on the other hand. As this paper will outline, the focus has often been on male perpetrators and female victims. The portrayal of female perpetration reveals dichotomous stereotypes, often neglecting the complexity of the subject matter. This paper focuses on the ways in which sexualization is used specifically to portray female perpetrators in The Reader, as a fictional Holocaust film. An assessment of Hanna’s relationship to Michael and her autonomous sexuality and her later inferior, victimized portrayal as an ambiguous perpetrator is the focus of my paper. Hanna’s sexuality is structurally separated from her role as a perpetrator. Hanna’s perpetration is, through the dichotomous motif of sexuality throughout the film, characterized by a feminization. However, this feminization entails a relativization of Hanna’s culpability, revealing a pejorative of her depiction as a perpetrator. Consequently, I argue that Hanna’s sexualized female body is constructed as a central part of the revelation of her perpetration.

Females perpetrating honour-based abuse: controllers, collaborators or coerced?

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to address an emerging international debate about the involvement of females in perpetrating honour-based abuse (HBA). Presenting new empirical data, this study profiles the different roles played by women, discussing them in relation to gender and their relationships to victims, and argues that acknowledgement of female perpetrators does not fundamentally challenge a gendered interpretation of HBA. Design/methodology/approach Some 1,474 case files flagged as HBA were gathered from one police force in Southern England and 50 domestic abuse agencies across England and Wales. Descriptive statistics explored which victim, perpetrator and abuse characteristics were associated with female perpetration. Case narratives were thematically analysed to profile the different roles females played. Findings were explored in eight key informant interviews with caseworkers from the services data came from. Findings This paper finds that: females are more involved in perpetrating HBA than other forms of domestic abuse, but primary perpetrators are still mostly male; victims are overwhelmingly female; the context for abuse is the maintenance of patriarchal values on gender roles; female perpetrator roles vary, meriting further exploration; and female perpetrators can be conceptualised within a gendered framework. Originality/value This paper presents important new empirical data to advance the debate on the role of women in perpetrating HBA. It will be of interest to academics, researchers, policy-makers, and practitioners alike.

Situational Contexts of Rural Violence: A Comparison of Male and Female Perpetration

The amount of social scientific knowledge about rural violence pales in comparison with that of urban violence, and even less is known about the situational contexts of rural violence. Using National Crime Victimization Survey data, we explore situational contexts of rural violence in general, as well as compare male- and female-perpetrated violence contexts. Results indicate that the contexts of violence committed by females are characterized by main effects (i.e., no weapons, no injuries across a variety of contexts), while male-perpetrated violence is highly contextual. An important finding emerged from studying contexts associated with male offenders and female victims—in every dominant context with one exception, male perpetrators were engaged in woman abuse. These findings highlight the need for greater attention to rural violence and variation in how this violence is perpetrated.

An Eye for an Eye: Gender Revanchisme and the Negation of Attachment in Domestic Violence Policy

Domestic violence policy and practice occupy a unique, complex, and often paradoxical cultural and legal space. The criminalization of domestic violence stands in stark contrast to greater social tolerance for violence among other family role sets, particularly those involving children. Debates concerning the role of gender in domestic violence emphasizing either male perpetration toward females or broadening the analysis to include mutuality of violence, female perpetration, and same-sex partner violence miss both key latent sociopolitical functions of policy and the greater complexity of gender across other forms of family violence. Harsher criminal penalties for offenders and current Duluth model inspired treatment approaches have not produced any evidence of commensurate declines in domestic violence. We have substituted vengeance for efficacy in our zeal to displace societal responsibility for domestic violence to scapegoated “batterers.”

Writing the Terrorist Self: The Unspeakable Alterity of Italy's Female Perpetrators

This paper examines texts written by, or in collaboration with, female ex-members of the Italian left-wing armed organization, the Red Brigades. The corpus differs from male-authored or male-centred texts in that issues relating to identity and selfhood lie at the very heart of the project of narrating the terrorist past; the primary concern of Italian women's post-terrorist narration is not to narrate the experience of belonging to an armed organization, but to construct a new identity distinct from a pre-existing self identified exclusively with the transgressive experience of political violence. I consider the corpus in the light of a number of critical problems posed both by the specificity of female perpetration and by the dearth of theoretical writings on perpetrator trauma more generally. I identify in each text an acute anxiety about the very act of speech or narration and find that, in order to circumvent the perceived prohibition on speech, the women of the Red Brigades subtly insinuate into their life writing a discourse of alterity bordering on subalternity that obscures the boundary between victim and perpetrator. The unacknowledged slippage between discourses of perpetration and victimization is explored in relation to Ruth Leys’ critique of Cathy Caruth's formulation of trauma as the wound that cries out through the voice of the victim. The paper concludes by questioning whether perpetrator trauma can ever be articulated as such and by considering the implications of that question for traumatized perpetrator and victimized society alike.