Book Review: Girls and violence: Tracing the roots of criminal behavior

• Author: Jeanette M. Hussemann
• Published date: 01 September 2014
• Date: 01 September 2014
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0734016814531778
• Subject Matter: Book Reviews

Book Reviews

Book Reviews

Ryder, J. A. (2014).

Girls and violence: Tracing the roots of criminal behavior. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers. 208 pp. $55.00

(Hardback), ISBN 978-1-58826-838-9.

Reviewed by: Jeanette M. Hussemann, Urban Institute, Washington, DC, USA

DOI: 10.1177/0734016814531778

Girls and Violence: Tracing the Roots of Criminal Behavior by Judith A. Ryder examines violence

perpetrated by young women, including why girls commit acts of violence and how girls interpret

their own violent actions and experiences. Ryder focuses specific attention to the process by which

girls’ attachments to primary caregivers within the context of family- and community-related

trauma experiences contribute to the onset of violent behavior. Her research relies on the inter-

views of 24 teenage girls who were born into poor and violent urban neighborhoods in New York

City in the 1980s and who were adjudicated and remanded to custody in the mid-1990s for the

offenses of burglary and robbery. These 24 interviews are derived from the larger federally funded

study, Learning About Violence and Drugs Among Adolescence, which investigates the relation-

ship between juvenile drug use and violent offending.

In the first and second chapters, Ryder provides a discussion of the setting and theoretical

impetus of the research. The 1980s marks a particularly poignant time in our criminal justice

history in which the United States experienced a significant rise in crack cocaine use and vio-

lence in poor African American communities, which was subsequently followed by the passage

of a plethora of punitive criminal justice policies. The panic that led to new federal and state

mandatory sentencing laws disproportionately affected low-level, nonviolent African American

women and the ir children and, as the rate of female imprisonment increased, so too did the num-

ber of children left without parents and safe home environments. It is in this context that the girls in

this study behav e violently.

In Chapter 3, Ryder focuses on the significance of parental bonds or lack thereof. Relying on

attachment theory, Ryder argues that the pattern and quality of parental attachment, support, and

supervision influence the development of violent behavior for young women. The stories in this

chapter offer a rich description of the stress induced by the girls’ families. Many indicate that they

do not trust nor feel emotionally safe with their parents, and more often than not express feeling

misunderstood, isolated, angry, and rejected. Ryder argues that a desire for loving and supportive

parental and adult relationships generates frustration and anxiety for young women, which

manifests itself into defiant, disruptive, and violent behaviors.

In Chapters 4 and 5, Ryder focuses on the experiences of traumatic events, including direct vic-

timization, witnessed violence, and loss. Chapter 4 focuses specifically on girls’ experiences of

physical and sexual abuse in homes and communities. Chapter 5 focuses on experiences of loss,

including the death of a loved one, the psychological and physical absence of the mother, and loss

of a home. As is the case with many girls in the justice system, the girls in this study experience

Criminal Justice Review

2014, Vol. 39(3) 339-351

ª2014 Georgia State University

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