Neither villain nor victim : empowerment and agency among women substance abusers / edited by Tammy L. Anderson.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Anderson, Tammy L., 1963-

Series:

Critical issues in crime and society

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Women drug addicts.

Female offenders--Drug use.

Female offenders.

Women prisoners--Drug use.

Women prisoners.

Female offenders--Rehabilitation.

Women prisoners--Rehabilitation.

Drug abuse--Prevention.

Drug abuse.

Drug abuse--Treatment.

Physical Description:

xv, 226 pages ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, [2008]

Summary:

Female drug addicts are often stereotyped either as promiscuous, lazy, and selfish, or as weak, scared, and trapped into addiction. These depictions typify the "pathology and powerlessness" narrative that has historically characterized popular and academic conversations about female substance abusers. Neither Villain Nor Victim attempts to correct these polarizing perspectives by presenting a critical feminist analysis of the drug world. By shifting the discussion to one centered on women's agency and empowerment, this book reveals the complex experiences and social relationships of women addicts.

Essays explore a range of topics, including the many ways that women negotiate the illicit drug world, how former drug addicts manage the more intimate aspects of their lives as they try to achieve abstinence, how women tend to use intervention resources more positively than their male counterparts, and how society can improve its response to female substance abusers by moving away from social controls (such as the criminalization of prostitution) and rehabilitative programs that have been shown to fail women in the long term. Advancing important new perspectives about the position of women in the drug world, this book is essential reading in courses on women and crime, feminist theory, and criminal justice.

Contents:

Dimensions of women's power in the illicit drug economy / Tammy L. Anderson

Seeing women, power, and drugs through the lens of embodiment / Elizabeth Ettorre

Demonstrating a female-specific agency and empowerment in drug selling / R. Baskin and Ira Sommers

Negotiating the streets : women, power, and resistance in street-life social networks / Christopher W. Mullins

Women's agency in the context of drug use / Yasmina Katsulis and Kim M. Blankenship

Facilitating change for women? : exploring the role of therapeutic jurisprudence in drug court / Christine A. Saum and Allison R. Gray

Negotiating gender for couples in methadone maintenance treatment / Margaret Kelley

A spoonful of sugar? : treating women in prison / Margaret S. Malloch

More of a danger to myself : community reentry of dually diagnosed females involved with the criminal justice system / Stephanie W. Hartwell

"Hustling" to save women's lives : empowerment strategies of recovering HIV-positive women / Michelle Tracy Berger

Drug use, prostitution, and globalization : a modest proposal for rethinking policy / Phyllis Coontz and Cate Greibel.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780813542089

0813542081

9780813542096

081354209X

OCLC:

137305665