When Mothers Kill: Interviews from Prison

When Mothers Kill: Interviews from Prison

ISBN-10:
0814757022
ISBN-13:
9780814757024
Pub. Date:
06/01/2008
Publisher:
New York University Press
ISBN-10:
0814757022
ISBN-13:
9780814757024
Pub. Date:
06/01/2008
Publisher:
New York University Press
When Mothers Kill: Interviews from Prison

When Mothers Kill: Interviews from Prison

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Overview

Winner of the 2008 Outstanding Book Award by the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences
Michelle Oberman and Cheryl L. Meyer don’t write for news magazines or prime-time investigative television shows, but the stories they tell hold the same fascination. When Mothers Kill is compelling. In a clear, direct fashion the authors recount what they have learned from interviewing women imprisoned for killing their children. Readers will be shocked and outraged—as much by the violence the women have endured in their own lives as by the violence they engaged in—but they will also be informed and even enlightened.
Oberman and Meyer are leading authorities on their subject. Their 2001 book, Mothers Who Kill Their Children, drew from hundreds of newspaper articles as well as from medical and social science journals to propose a comprehensive typology of maternal filicide. In that same year, driven by a desire to test their typology—and to better understand child-killing women not just as types but as individuals—Oberman and Meyer began interviewing women who had been incarcerated for the crime. After conducting lengthy, face-to-face interviews with forty prison inmates, they returned and selected eight women to speak with at even greater length. This new book begins with these stories, recounted in the matter-of-fact words of the inmates themselves.
There are collective themes that emerge from these individual accounts, including histories of relentless interpersonal violence, troubled relationships with parents (particularly with mothers), twisted notions of romantic love, and deep conflicts about motherhood. These themes structure the books overall narrative, which also includes an insightful examination of the social and institutional systems that have failed these women. Neither the mothers nor the authors offer these stories as excuses for these crimes.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780814757024
Publisher: New York University Press
Publication date: 06/01/2008
Edition description: New Edition
Pages: 208
Product dimensions: 6.10(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Cheryl L. Meyer is Professor of Psychology at Wright State University School of Professional Psychology in Dayton, Ohio. She is also the author of The Wandering Uterus (NYU Press).

Michelle Oberman is Professor of Law at Santa Clara University School of Law.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

I The Stories

  1. 1 The Saddest Stories

  2. 2 “She’s the World to Me”: The Mother-Daughter Relationships Described by Mothers Who Committed Filicide

  3. 3 Fighting for Love: Filicidal Mothers and Their Male Partners

  4. 4 Mothering: Hopes, Expectations, and Realities

  5. 5 Punishment, Shame, and Guilt

II Making Sense of the Stories

  1. 6 Interactions with the State: Holes in the Safety Nets

  2. 7 The End of the Story

    Appendix A: Methodology
    Appendix B: Neonaticide
    Appendix C: Mothers Who Purposely Kill Their Children Notes
    Index
    About the Authors

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Powerful and judiciously researched, When Mothers Kill blends personal stories with social science to offer insights on some truly disturbing crimes. In sharing the stories of these women, Michelle Oberman and Cheryl Meyer balance empathy with a realistic assessment of the context surrounding each crime."-M/C Reviews,

“The interview data culled by Oberman and Meyer, coupled with their discerning discourse, are an invaluable contribution to the research literature appertaining to the crime of filicide.”
-Metapsychology.net

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“Those working in social services could benefit from reading this book. Perhaps teaching women about abuse early in their lives or providing them with more domestic abuse resources can help prevent future such cases.”
-Library Journal

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“Oberman and Meyer’s investigation of the convicted women’s traumatic personal histories offers readers an opportunity to separate the women who command our pity from their crimes.”
-The Chronicle of Higher Education

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“The authors do not present this abuse as an excuse for their behavior. Rather, they show how the abuse fits into a larger picture of isolation and limited prospects for a better life. Readers come away with a clear sense of how little these women had in the way of social support that might have helped them cope with the demands of motherhood, and are left to ponder the culpability of those who were in a position to provide this social support, but did not.”
-Choice

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