Lynda Lytle Holmstrom

The victim of rape : institutional reactions

This unprecedented in-depth account of how our major institutions respond to the crime of rape is the first empirical study of rape victims in the United States as they come into contact with the police, the hospital, and the court. It presents the often devastating effects of institutional processing of rape victims. The authors, a sociologist and a psychiatric nurse, provide direct, on-the-scene reports of how rape victims endure the institutional process.

The second assault : rape and public attitudes

The first in-depth empirical study that goes beyond the initial trauma of rape and considers the interplay between society and the experience of rape, the interaction between the victim and her own social world.

RAPE: SEXUAL DISRUPTION AND RECOVERY

In a longitudinal study of 81 adult rape victims reinterviewed four to six years later, effects of the rape on subsequent sexual functioning are analyzed. Most victims who had been sexually active were found to experience changes in frequency of sexual activity and in sexual response. Interview responses of victims are reported, and suggestions are offered for the counseling of rape victims and their sexual partners.

Sexual behavior of assailants during reported rapes.

The present study reports on the forced sexual, excretory, and sadistic acts that occur during rape. The main sample consisted of 115 adult, adolescent, and child rape victims that were admitted during a 1-year period to the emergency wards of a large municipal hospital. Forced vaginal intercourse was the most frequent act reported, but many other acts also occurred, ranging from fellatio and cunnilingus to urinating on the victim. It is argued that various social-psychological meanings are attached to forced sexual acts, most notably power, anger, and male camaraderie. Pair/group rape differs from single-assailant rape in the emphasis placed on watching and taking turns. Analyzing the social meanings attached to forced sex makes a contribution to our knowledge about the use of sex to express nonsexual issues.

Rapists’ talk: Linguistic strategies to control the victim∗

Abstract Rape is a crime of violence and force. The stereotype of the male rapists attack is that he attains power and control over the victim through strategies based on physical force. The present study shows that not only do rapists use physically based strategies, but also they use a second set of strategies based on language. The sample consists of 115 female adult, adolescent, and child rape victims. Open‐ended interviews were used and information was collected on what conversation occurred. In analyzing what rapists reportedly said, 11 major themes emerged: threats, orders, confidence lines, personal inquiries of the victim, personal revelations by the rapist, obscene names and racial epithets, inquiries about the victims sexual “enjoyment,” soft‐sell departures, sexual put downs, possession of women, and taking property from another male. What these themes have in common is that they constitute a strategy for exercising power over the victim, either before, during, or after the rape.

Everett Cherrington Hughes A Tribute to a Pioneer in the Study of Work and Occupations

This article pays tribute to Everett Cherrington Hughes. The focus is on Hughes the person as opposed to Hughes the scholar. However, for Everett there was no arbitrary separation of the two. The hallmark of his career was his endless curiosity. He never tired of observing, and drew upon sources as diverse as members of his family and peoples around the world. He insisted on analysis grounded in data gathered with an open mind. Although he made numerous contributions to the substantive area of work and occupations, he prided himself on being a generalist; he saw studying occupations as a way of studying society.

Rape Typology and the Coping Behavior of Rape Victims

To understand rape from the victim’s point of view, we spent a year talking with all rape victims admitted to the emergency floors of the Boston City Hospital. It became clear in our conversations that rape is an act initiated by the assailant, and that it is not primarily a sexual act but an act of violence. We learned that it was very important to the victims how their assailants gained access to them, that is, the mode of attack. We therefore analyzed all these cases, whether adult, adolescent, or child victims, and we developed a typology of rape based on the assailant’s method of attack. The two main styles were (1) the blitz rape and (2) the confidence rape.