Project
Women and Men as Murder Violators and Murder Victims: Gender and Homicide in Columbus, 1980-2005
Investigator
Meghan Myers (Sociology)
Abstract
Homicide by women and homicides of women are relatively rare in the United States. As a result, large-scale studies of gender and homicide are infrequent and therefore much remains to be learned about gender and its impact on crime. By utilizing a large-scale data set of about 2,500 homicides in the city of Columbus spanning 25 years, the present research helps to remedy this omission in two ways. The first is to address micro-level factors surrounding homicide and gender, such as weapon type, the relationship between victim and offender, and the reasons given for why the homicide took place. The second is to address how macro-level variables affect homicide and in particular, how gender composition and the male to female ratio may impact homicide rates. Furthermore, and consistent with much previous literature on homicide, the present research also explores the relationship between racial and economic structural inequalities and rates of homicide. The goal of the present research accordingly, is a more complete sociological understanding of how gender gets played out when women murder and women are murdered.