Arguing that we commonly understand "wife abuse" and the "battered woman" in terms of standardized images of problems and people, the author explores how these images inform and shape social services for women who have been assaulted. Using ethnographic data of shelter work from the perspective of workers, she shows how these standardized images affect organizational structure and how front-line workers make sense of their interventions into clients' lives.

"Based upon extensive ethnographic data that examines lives of homeless women who care for children and live in small shelters and transitional living centers. This ground-breaking study unveils the centrality of abuse and poverty in homeless women's lives and outlines societal responses that should be more effective"--Provided by publisher.

In the supposedly enlightened ’60s and ’70s, violence against women was widespread. It wasn’t talked about, and women had few, if any, options to escape their abusers. Yet in 1973 — with no statistics, no money and little public support — five disparate groups of Canadian women quietly opened Canada’s first battered women’s shelters. Today, there are well over 600. In Runaway Wives and Rogue Feminists, journalist Margo Goodhand tracks down the “rogue feminists” whose work forged an underground railway for women and children, weaving their stories into an unforgettable — and until now untold — history. As they lobbied for funding, scrounged for furniture and fended off outraged husbands, these women marked a defining moment in Canadian history, triggering monumental changes in government, schools, courts and law enforcement. But was it enough to stop the cycle of violence? Forty years later, these pioneers describe how and why Canada has lost its ground in the battle for women’s rights.

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In this latest edition of her groundbreaking book, Dr. Lenore Walker has provided a thorough update to her original findings in the field of domestic abuse. Each chapter has been expanded to include new research. The volume contains the latest on the impact of exposure to violence on children, marital rape, child abuse, personality characteristics of different types of batterers, new psychotherapy models for batterers and their victims, and more. Walker also speaks out on her involvement in the O.J. Simpson trial as a defense witness and how he does not fit the empirical data known for domestic violence. This volume should be required reading for all professionals in the field of domestic abuse. For Further Information, Please Click Here!

First full biography of an international figure, recently in the news after her successful libel case against Andrew Marry, who described her as a terrorist in The Making of Modern Britain Internationally famous for starting one of the first women's refuges in the modern world, Erin Pizzey is a controversial but hugely-respected activist with enemies on the left and the right, a pioneering figure in the maelstrom of seventies politics, and a key witness of the era. Here, she tells her story in full for the first time. The daughter of a diplomat, Erin Pizzey was born in China in 1939. One of her formative experiences was seeing her parents and brother being put under house arrest by the Maoists in 1949. This instilled a hatred of totalitarian regimes and for a short time Pizzey even worked for MI6 in Hong Kong. Once relocated in the UK, Pizzey was soon swept up by sixties radicalism and the early days of the emerging Women's Liberation Movement. Opening a small community center for maltreated women in Chiswick in 1971 was to bring Pizzey to the front line of what was becoming a national issue in a time when feminists were still treated with hostility and derision by right-wing figures, but also when left-wing radicals scorned anyone, like Pizzey, who put humanity before ideology. By the mid-1970s, Pizzey found herself under bomb threat and picketed by feminists for allowing men to staff refuges: this led to a long exile from the UK where she kept up her activities and achieved international recognition, while also reinventing herself as a best-selling writer. Erin Pizzey's life and trials have been unique; her story is a compelling one, vital to any understanding of a more revolutionary age and burning issues that still resonate today.

This provocative book presents a strengths-based framework that challenges negative stereotypes about battered women. The volume also outlines ways to improve research, risk assessment, and safety planning.