Abstract
This essay makes the case for a transformative critical feminist criminology, one that explicitly theorizes gender, one that requires a commitment to social justice, and one that must increasingly be global in scope. Key to this re-thinking of a mature field is the need to expand beyond traditional positivist notions of “science,” to embrace core elements of a feminist approach to methodology, notably the epistemological insights gleaned from a new way of thinking about research, methods, and the relationship between the knower and the known. Other key features of contemporary feminist criminology include an explicit commitment to intersectionality, an understanding of the unique positionality of women in the male dominated fields of policing and corrections, a focus on masculinity and the gender gap in serious crime, a critical assessment of corporate media and the demonization of girls and women of color, and a recognition of the importance of girls’ studies as well as women’s studies to the development of a global, critical feminist criminology.
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Notes
The women’s movement has traditionally been divided into two historic “waves,” despite the fact that work on the status of women can be dated well before the first of these events, and continued in a rather clear form after the first “wave” passed. Generally, however, the first “wave” is recognized as starting with the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848, and the second “wave” is dated to the publication of Betty Friedan’s influential book, The Feminine Mystique in 1963.
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Chesney-Lind, M., Morash, M. Transformative Feminist Criminology: A Critical Re-thinking of a Discipline. Crit Crim 21, 287–304 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-013-9187-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-013-9187-2