Violent Intimacy : Family Harmony, State Stability, and Intimate Partner Violence in Post-Socialist China

Winner of the 2022 Research Publication Book Award from the Association of Chinese Professors of Social Sciences in the United States.Based on ethnographic research with victims of intimate partner violence since 2014, this book brings to the forefront women's experiences of, negotiations about, and contestations against violence, and men's narratives about the reasons for their violence. Using an innovative methodology - online chat groups, it foregrounds the role of history, structural inequalities, and the cultural system of power hierarchy in situating and constructing intimate partner violence. Centering on men and women's narratives about violence, this book connects intimate partner violence with invisible structural violence – the historical, cultural, political, economic, and legal context that gives rise to and perpetuates violence against women. Through examining the ways in which women's lives are constrained by various forms of violence, hierarchy, and inequality, this book shows that violence against women is a structural issue that is historically produced and politically and culturally engaged. "Based on ethnographic research with victims of intimate partner violence since 2014, this book brings to the forefront women's experiences of, negotiations about, and contestations against violence and men's narratives about the reasons for their violence. It foregrounds the role of history, structural inequalities, and the cultural system of power hierarchy in situating and constructing intimate partner violence. Centering on men and women's narratives about violence, this book connects intimate partner violence with invisible structural violence - the historical, cultural, political, economic, and legal context that gives rise to and perpetuates violence against women. Through examining the ways in which women's lives are constrained by various forms of violence, hierarchy, and inequality, this book shows that violence against women is a structural issue that is historically produced and politically and culturally engaged"-- Provided by publisher Cover Half Title Epigraph Title Copyright Dedication Contents Acknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1 A Social and Cultural History of Intimate Partner Violence in China Chapter 2 Worthy versus Unworthy Victims of Sexual Violence in Post-Socialist China Chapter 3 The Criminal Justice System and Intimate Partner Violence Chapter 4 Male Perceptions and Rationalizations of Intimate Partner Violence in Post-Socialist China Chapter 5 Everyday Resistance of Women against Intimate Partner Violence Chapter 6 Activism and Intimate Partner Violence Afterword Notes References Index