SOCY 275 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Multiple Sex Partners, Arson, Wish Fulfillment
15 Jun 2018
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WEEK 10
Gender-based theories
Traditional theories
- Caesar Lombroso, female offender
o Focus on biological factors and sexuality
o People who engage in crime tend to look physically different
o Believed tht criminals were lower on the evolutionary scale
o Female offenders were child like, had lower sensitcity and lower intellifence
o Looked at cranial structure – females and males had larger and odd shaped skulls
and lots of body hair
o Argued that women tended to be more homogenous – similar
- William Thomas, The Unadjusted Girl
o Focus on biology
o Ketabolic – term he used to describe the genders
▪ Applied mainly to males
▪ Males exhibited more aggression but also that males were more creative
o Anabolic
▪ Applied mainly to females
▪ More lethargic
▪ More withdrawn
▪ Quieter
▪ Implies storing of energy
o When we have female criminals they are behaving more like males
o Wish fulfillment – desires that people have – can lead people to good or evil
o Middle class women are socialized away from deviant roles – socialized towards
conventional paths
o Lower class women are unsocialized – have unchecked desires. May pursue
desire of wealth through deviant means (prostitution)
o Lots of female crimes involve males
o Crimes like prostitution are sexuality things
- Otto Pollak, The Criminality of Women
o Certain biological events lead women to crime
o Menstruation leads theft, homicide, arson,
o Pregnancy leads to greater increase in attacks on infants (abortions), and
infanticide
o Menopause leads to arson, breaches of peace, lying in court
o Emphasis on sexuality based on hormonal shifts
- Gisela Konopka, The Adolescent Girl in Conflict
o Focuses on biology, especially puberty
o Puberty is traumatic experience for girls
o Part of the problem is being bullied by peers, and misunderstanding parents
o There may be competition between daughters and mothers
o First theorist to highlight role of labour market
▪ Many girls are unable to get jobs – this leads to crime
- Clyde Vedder and Dora Somerville, the Delinquent Girl
o Emphasized different types of female delinquency
o The runaway girl – does not live at home
o Incorrigible girl – swears a lot, doesn’t go to class
o The sex delinquent girl – teen who has multiple sex partners, pregnancy
o More critical attention to social treatment
- Common emphasis through all theories on hormones, sexuality, irrationality, low
intelligence
Power control theory
- By: John Hagan, A.R. Gillis, and John Simpson
- Core assumption-- Presence of power and absence of control creates conditions of
freedom that permit common forms of delinquency
o Not a theory about more serious crimes like homicide but rather about drinking at
a young age, smoking etc.
o Parents who have a lot of power at work, bring this to the house to – they give
more freedom to their children – reject tough discipline
o Parents who are in lower positions at work, are more strict with their kids
- Parents control in occupational structure reproduced in the family
- Instrument- object relationship
o Main instrument especially in more traditional families is that the mother is the
main instrument of control and daughters are the main objects of the relationships
o Father goes to work
o Mother spends more time in contact with the children
o Mothers can control daughters more
o
- Patriarchal vs. egalitarian families
o Egalitarian
▪ Both parents work
▪ Both parents fully engaged in discipline of kids
▪ Both daughters and sons are equally disciplined
o Patriarchal
▪ Father goes to work
▪ Mother stays home
▪ Daughters get more discipline and are more controlled
- Looks at social class, and gender difference between girls and boys
- Focus on how social class permeates into family parenting
- Brings in conflict theories
- Instrumental control is the surveillance – when parents want to know everything about
what is happening
