Abstract
Readers with an interest in gender violence will find this recent publication pertinent, with its focus on rape among intimate partners. Katharine Tellis’s goal is “to make sexual assault visible in domestic violence” (p. 140). This is a particularly noteworthy aim since sexual assault in the context of domestic violence has been identified as a serious problem among professionals who work with family violence victims, and yet it is underresearched by academics. This lack of research data translates into less information to assist police, prosecutors, courts, and counselors, who are working with intimate rape victims. The challenges of supporting domestic sexual assault survivors are augmented because “when you are raped by a stranger you live with a frightening memory, but when you are raped by your husband, you live with your rapist” (Yllo, 1999: 1060; Finkelhor & Yllo, 1985; cited p. 39). Tellis’s book should assist criminal justice specialists in providing more helpful interventions and assistance to injured women. I now turn to a succinct synopsis of the six book chapters.
In her introductory chapter, Tellis situates the abuse of women historically, both in the context of American state laws, which did not penalize men for raping their wives until relatively recently, and the Civil Rights Movement, which improved the situation for abused women, by providing legal tools for increasing their domestic safety. Then, Tellis suggests that her study “will use detailed case narratives from police reports of sexual battery to examine how women and men describe the alleged incident to investigating law enforcement officials, and to evaluate the criminal justice system’s treatment of these cases” (p. 8). The former is more achievable than the latter. Chapter two delves into how researchers deal with rape between intimate partners. This section covers both methodological and theoretical developments in the fields of domestic violence and sexual assault. This material is a useful synthesis for those lacking a background in these areas, but for specialists, this chapter is superfluous.
Tellis describes her research at the beginning of chapter three. Her data consist of 40 Florida police case files, gathered during eight months of 1999, by another researcher. Little information is provided on the file-gathering methodology; in fact, the reader is referred to another publication. I wanted to view this information, at least in an appendix, if not in the main text. Instead, Tellis devotes space to grounded theory, which should be well understood by her readership.
The following chapter is devoted to data description, in the form of frequency tables, correlations, and victim and perpetrator interview material from the police case files. Here, she focuses on her data in isolation, rather than the implications of her material for existing theory, which occurs in chapter five. In this section, Tellis examines the fit of her data with selected conceptual frameworks and typologies, specifically Michael P. Johnson’s (1995, 2005) partner violence typology, and David Finkelhor and Kersti Yllo’s (1985) marital rape typology. Tellis’s sample is roughly the same size as those of the two studies critiqued, and her data seem to fit well with the existing typologies. I wondered, given her interest in linking the two somewhat separated fields of domestic violence and rape if she might create her own typology, and attempt some reconciliation between the above two approaches, but this does not occur.
Chapter six is devoted to a summary of findings, and a brief evaluation of “the criminal justice response” (pp. 135-38). Given the claim in her introduction that she would “evaluate the criminal justice system’s treatment of these cases” (p. 8), I was disappointed with the cursory nature of this discussion. In Tellis’s defense, she is limited by her use of previously collected data, and lacks broader, contextual information, which constrains her evaluation.
In conclusion, Tellis conducted the reported research for her criminal justice doctorate, and the book still bears some dissertation traits. For example, she devotes 53 pages to situating the research methodologically and theoretically, while only dedicating 62 pages to the actual research methods, data analysis, and results. The book is a 2010 publication, and yet, the most recent cited publication dates to 2007. There are also occasional typographic errors. These are minor criticisms, and Tellis’s work is worthy of consultation by specialists in this area, and by academics, who wish to learn about this area. The book could be used productively as a supplementary textbook for a course on criminal justice and gender.