Domestic Tyranny: The Making of American Social Policy Against Family Violence from Colonial Times to the Present

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University of Illinois Press, 2004 - Family & Relationships - 273 pages
Elizabeth Pleck's Domestic Tyranny chronicles the rise and demise of legal, political, and medical campaigns against domestic violence from colonial times to the present. Based on in-depth research into court records, newspaper accounts, and autobiographies, this book argues that the single most consistent barrier to reform against domestic violence has been the Family Ideal--that is, ideas about family privacy, conjugal and parental rights, and family stability. This edition features a new introduction surveying the multinational and cultural themes now present in recent historical writing about family violence.
 

Contents

Introduction
3
Wicked Carriage
17
Parental Tyranny
34
The Drunkards Wife
49
Protecting the Innocents
69
The Pure Woman and the Brutish Man
88
Bringing Back the Whipping Post
108
REFORM THE PSYCHE AND THE STATE
123
Psychiatry Takes Control
145
The Pediatric Awakening
164
Assault at Home
182
Epilogue
201
Copyright

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About the author (2004)

Elizabeth Pleck is a professor of history, human and community development at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her two most recent books are Celebrating the Family: Ritual, Consumer Culture, and Ethnicity and (coauthored with Cele Otnes) Cinderella Dreams: The Allure of the Lavish Wedding.

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