Dangerous Exits: Escaping Abusive Relationships in Rural America (Critical Issues in Crime and Society)

185 Pages·2009·0.97 MB·English

by  Walter S.

Dangerous Exits
Critical Issues in Crime and Society
Raymond J.Michalowski,Series Editor
Tammy L.Anderson,ed.,Neither Villain Nor Victim:Empowerment and
Agency among Women Substance Abusers
Mary Bosworth and Jeanne Flavin,eds.,Race,Gender,and Punishment:From
Colonialism to the War on Terror
Loretta Capeheart and Dragan Milovanovic,Social Justice:Theories,Issues,
and Movements
Patricia E.Erickson and Steven K.Erickson,Crime,Punishment,and Mental
Illness:Law and the Behavioral Sciences in Conflict
Luis A.Fernandez,Policing Dissent:Social Control and the Anti-Globalization
Movement
Michael J.Lynch,Big Prisons,Big Dreams:Crime and the Failure of America's
Penal System
Raymond J.Michalowski and Ronald C.Kramer,eds.,State-Corporate
Crime:Wrongdoing at the Intersection of Business and Government
Susan L.Miller,Victims as Offenders:The Paradox of Women's Violence in
Relationships
Anthony M.Platt,The Child Savers:The Invention of Delinquency,40th
Anniversary Edition with an introduction and critical commentaries
compiled by Miroslava Chávez-García
Susan F.Sharp,Hidden Victims:The Effects of the Death Penalty on Families
of the Accused
Robert H.Tillman and Michael L.Indergaard,Pump and Dump:The Rancid
Rules of the New Economy
Mariana Valverde,Law and Order:Images,Meanings,Myths
Michael Welch,Crimes of Power & States of Impunity:The U.S.Response
to Terror
Michael Welch,Scapegoats of September 11th:Hate Crimes and State Crimes in
the War on Terror
Dangerous Exits
(cid:1)
Escaping Abusive
Relationships
in Rural America
Walter S. DeKeseredy
and
Martin D. Schwartz
Rutgers University Press
New Brunswick,New Jersey,and London
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
DeKeseredy,Walter S.,1959–
Dangerous exits :escaping abusive relationships in rural America /
Walter S.DeKeseredy,Martin D.Schwartz.
p. cm. — (Critical issues in crime and society)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8135-4518-9 (hardcover :alk.paper) —
ISBN 978-0-8135-4519-6 (pbk.:alk.paper)
1. Wife abuse—Ohio—Case studies. 2.Sexual abuse victims—Ohio—
Case studies. 3. Sociology,Rural—Ohio—Case studies. 4. Patriarchy—
Ohio—Case studies. I. Schwartz,Martin D. II.Title.
HV6626.22.O35D445 2009
362.82'9209771091734—dc22 2008035433
A British Cataloging-in-Publication record for this book is available
from the British Library.
Copyright © 2009 by Walter S.DeKeseredy and Martin D.Schwartz
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical,or by any information storage and retrieval system,with-
out written permission from the publisher. Please contact Rutgers University
Press,100 Joyce Kilmer Avenue,Piscataway,NJ 08854-8099.The only exception
to this prohibition is “fair use”as defined by U.S.copyright law.
Visit our Web site:http://rutgerspress.rutgers.edu
Manufactured in the United States of America
Typesetting:BookType
Contents
Foreword by Joseph F.Donnermeyer vii
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xiii
1. Introduction: The Dark Side of the Heartland 1
2. Thinking Theoretically about Separation
and Divorce Sexual Assault 27
3. The Study: Doing Feminist Research
in the Heartland 47
4. Exiting Dangerous Relationships: Rural Women’s
Experiences of Abuse and Risk Factors 61
5. The Consequences of Abuse and Women’s
Social Support Experiences 81
6. Where Do We Go from Here? Research,
Theory, and Policy 96
Appendix A.
Separation/Divorce Sexual Assault Screen Questions 127
Appendix B.
Semi-Structured Interview Schedule 131
Notes 137
References 143
Index 161
v

Foreword
Dangerous Exits speaks to the plight of rural women (and women
everywhere) in abusive relationships.Walter DeKeseredy and Martin
Schwartz vividly describe the ways in which rural culture and rural
society (and culture and society everywhere) can enable these forms
of violence to both emerge and persist.Further,this work passionately
advocates for ways that rural communities (and all places,everywhere)
can and should respond to a social problem covered up by layers of
traditional and anachronistic assumptions about the roles of women
and men in society,by the skewed and biased responses (and often,no
response) of some rural law enforcement and social agencies serving
rural populations,and by norms of tolerance (and even silence) among
neighbors,kin,clergy,and localleadersforbehaviorsthatshouldproduce
moral outrage.
Dangerous Exits is so multidimensional in its approach that it simul-
taneously informs the literature in rural criminology,critical criminology,
feminist criminology,feminist studies in general,police studies,the soci-
ology of the community,social action and community development,rural
sociology,violence against women,and the treatment and rehabilitation
of crime victims.However,it is not simply the number of diverse ways
that the reader can approach this book that makes it a significant contri-
bution to the literature.It is the incredible number of lessons contained
within the stories of forty-three rural women,combined with the schol-
arship of DeKeseredy and Schwartz.
The authors point out that violence against women is a form of
terrorism invisible to most of the public,hidden behind a silent wall of
women too intimidated and fearful to act,communities in denial about
problems that exist in their own backyards,and criminal justice and social
service agencies who seem to have other priorities.
vii
viii Foreword
Weaving quotations from the forty-three rural women they inter-
viewed with literature from criminology, feminist studies, and rural
sociology,DeKeseredy and Schwartz demonstrate why a critical perspec-
tive should be a primary approach to the study of rural crime in the years
ahead.While many scholars of rural sociology have taken an approach to
research and theorizing that reflects the observation of C.W.Mills that
personal troubles must be understood within the context of public issues,
most rural sociologists do not consciously embrace a critical perspective.
This is probably because most rural sociologists feel compelled to
approach their work seeking a multilevel sociological understanding of
rural issues, which recognizes that what happens at specific rural and
remote places,and to the people who live there,cannot be understood
without reference to social structures,social change,and relationships of
dependency with the larger world,especially when economic,political,
and cultural power resides mostly at urban centers.
DeKeseredy and Schwartz see things that many other scholars do not.
For example,they inform readers,rural communities are as diverse as cities
and suburbs,and simplistic rural-urban dichotomies are not very good ways
to approach the study of rural crime in general, and of separation and
divorce sexual assault specifically.
Perhaps of greater importance,by linking social structure and culture
as expressed in the rural context,the authors pose a tough,scholarly chal-
lenge to mainstream criminological theory and related research,especially
that associated with social disorganization theory and its revision around
the concept of collective efficacy.The authors also challenge rural soci-
ologists who have uncritically grabbed hold of the concept of social capital
as if it always functions for the good of rural people.As DeKeseredy and
Schwartz illustrate,crime in all its dimensions varies according to what
kinds of social organization,forms of collective efficacy,and expressions
of social capital are in play.For example,as many of the women in this
book attest from experience, men in the rural context described here
support and encourage their peers to abuse women.To show how some
rural men learn,act out,and obtain approval for their abusing and violent
behavior by peers,the authors describe relationships and primary group
networks that fall within what many criminologists and rural sociologists
refer to as gemeinschaft.
Foreword ix
Dangerous Exitsnever lets us forget that nonintervention and minimal
assistance on the part of family,friends,neighbors,and law enforcement
represent the norm in many local,rural social structures.And,the authors
show,these enablers of violence against rural women exist alongside the
very features of rural places that constrain violence,abusive actions,and
for that matter, all forms of crime.Along with the mistaken idea of a
straightforward rural-urban dichotomy,which fails to appreciate the diver-
sity of rural places, we must also discard the hackneyed notion that
organization means less crime and that disorganization means more crime.
It is not that simple.
In terms of the new scholarship on rural crime,this book deserves
a special place.First,DeKeseredy and Schwartz revise their own model,
reevaluating their and others' naïve views about rural communities and
the ways in which traditional criminological approaches fail to appre-
ciate the connection between rural social structure,culture,and crime.
Second, the authors ask their interviewees for their own recom-
mendations for change.Familiar recommendations for better educational
and job opportunities, subsidized housing, greater awareness of the
problem in society and local communities, and so on take on fresh
meaning in these women's words,unaffected by academic jargon.These
are real people,with real problems,telling us what they need to improve
their own lives,to stop the abuse,and to change local communities and
local cultures so that they constrain,not enable,the problem.
Finally,building upon and reinforcing the recommendations of their
subjects,DeKeseredy and Schwartz lay out an agenda for improving the
situation of rural survivors of separation and divorce sexual assault,
“modest proposals”that together comprise a powerful call for action and
policy change.
The content and context of violence against rural women forms the
core of Dangerous Exits, with accounts of abusive and violent behavior
related by the victims themselves.The book ultimately is a straightfor-
ward description of the mental, physical, economic, and social costs to
rural survivors of separation and divorce sexual assault.It is a frank account
of victims who fight the odds to find a road to recovery that does not
double back to the same place and to the same situation,and who do not
always succeed.