This study contends that the spaces where crime occurs in films are not neutral; they are layered with maps of meaning that we construct somewhere between the imagined and the lived. Given that popular cultural representations both shape and reflect our understandings of crime and space, a study examining where crime occurs in films was warranted but previously unrealized in the criminological literature. This study addresses this gap in the literature by considering how geographies of crime are characterized in a sample of ten recent popular crime films. Applying a qualitative content analysis approach, this study foregrounds the onscreen spaces where crimes occur in an attempt to expose and denaturalize the meanings around crime that are embedded in these backgrounds. Particular regard is given here to the twinning of crime and urbanity, the aesthetics of insecurity, and the gendering of geographies of crime.

Racism is a serious barrier to achieving employment equity in Canada. The intersectional nature of oppression creates a situation where, based on various characteristics including gender, place of birth, and ethnic group membership, individuals experience employment related racism differently from one another. This intersectionality indicates that policies that may protect one marginalized group may not protect all groups equally. Through an examination of current employment equity research and reports, an overview of employment equity and human rights legislation in Canada, and an analysis of data collected in three interviews with Black men living in Victoria, British Columbia, a series of recommendations are made for employers, allies, and policy changes. This research illuminates the inequity of employment experiences in Canada, and provides suggestions for next steps forward from members of a population currently underserved by existing employment equity measures. / Graduate / 0733 / 0631 / 0630 / jmetz@uvic.ca

Although interpersonal communication studies have focused on various aspects of interpersonal relationships, research on the player identity and gendered emotional manipulation in romantic relationships has received little attention. This narrative research inquiry was undertaken to explore perceptions of men and women related to the player identity and gendered emotional manipulation. This investigation used social construction as a theoretical perspective to understand three areas of investigation that include: the existence and relevance of the player identity, the player’s relation to emotionally manipulative behaviour, and the connection between socially constructed gender conventions and the player identity. Hesse-Biber’s (2006) feminist interviewing approach guided semi-structured interviews with six male and six female participants. Respondents reported the existence and relevance of the player identity in romantic relationships today, connecting this identity to emotionally manipulative behaviour, as well as relating this identity to traditional gender conventions. Finally, implications for men and women in romantic relationships today and future areas of research are discussed in light of these findings.

Using a feminist, autoethnographic methodology and in depth interviews with twenty-three participants, I sought to better understand the meaning of family memory keeping for women and their families through this research, paying particular attention to the ways that dominant gender ideologies shape family memory and the act of preserving family memory. This research also endeavoured to explore those instances wherein families lose that memory keeper due to memory loss, absence, or death. Interviews revealed that, despite its absence from the literature, women’s family memory keeping is a valuable form of gendered labour – and leisure – that makes significant individual, familial, and social contributions, while simultaneously reproducing dominant gender ideologies and gendered constructions of fatherhood, motherhood, and the family. Through an exploration of the loss of a mother’s memory due to illness, death, or absence, this study also demonstrated the loss of a mother’s memory is both deeply felt, and deeply gendered. However, this study illustrated participants challenging these dominant gender ideologies, as well, and using family memory keeping as a way to resist, critique, and cope. As such, this study speaks to the absence of women’s family memory keeping from the gendered work, leisure studies, social construction, and loss literature, contributing a better understanding of both the activity itself and the gendered ideologies that shape the activity, as well. Not only does this study speak to gaps in existing literature, but findings make fresh theoretical contributions to this literature through three new concepts: the notion of the good mother as the “remembering mother”, the concept of “compliance leisure”, and the re-envisioning of women’s unpaid labour as contributing to “the homing of the home”. And with these contributions to the literature, this research also provides valuable insight for professionals working to improve policy and services surrounding postpartum care, individual and family therapy, caregiving, extended care, and palliative care.

Women exert only a modicum of production power in 21st century cinema despite its growing accessibility and spectatorship through the developing technologies of the digital era. In 2007, of the top 250 grossing films in Hollywood, only 10% were written, and 6% directed, by women, and just 16% contained leading female protagonists. Why, after the gains of the film feminist movement, is there such a significant gender imbalance in mainstream film, and an imbalance that is only increasing over time? More significantly, what are the possibilities and limitations for reel woman’s subjectivity and agency, in and on screen, in this male-dominated landscape? As a female filmmaker in this current climate I conduct an autoethnographical scriptwriting-based investigation into female subjectivity and agency, by writing the feature length screenplay Float, which is both the dramatic experiment and the creative outcome of this research. The exegesis works symbiotically with my scriptwriting journey by outlining the broader contexts surrounding women filmmakers and their female representations. In this self-reflexive examination, I use an interdisciplinary methodology to unravel the overt and latent sites of resistance for reel woman today on three interdependent levels. These comprise the historical, political and philosophical background to woman’s treatment both behind, and in front of, the camera; my lived experiences as an emerging writer/director as I write Float; and my representation of the screenplay’s central female character. I use the multiple logic of screenplay diegesis to explore the issues that have a bearing on women’s ability to be active agents in the world they inhabit, including: the dichotomising of female desire, the influence of familial history, the repression of the mother, the dominance of the male gaze, the disavowal of female specificity, and women’s consequent dislocation from their self-determined desire. These obstacles are simultaneously negotiated as I map my process of writing Float and deal with the challenging contexts in which the screenplay was created. In the course of my scriptwriting investigation, film feminist and French poststructuralist paradigms are considered and negotiated as I experiment whether it is possible for female filmmakers, and their female characters, to overcome the seemingly insurmountable odds facing women’s actualisation today. My research brings to light the critical need for more inclusive modes of practice across the film industry, discourse and pedagogy that are cognisant and respectful of reel women’s difference, and allow them to explore their own specificity. The thesis argues that it would be advantageous for female filmmakers to challenge their ‘fixed’ status in phallocentric discourse, and to deconstruct their patriarchal conditioning through engagement with forms of identity and writing resistance that recognise the fluidity of their subjectivity, and the consequent potential for change. I also highlight the importance of an accessible and affirmative feminist cinema pertinent to the 21st century, to integrate feminist ideals into the mainstream, and finally bring reel woman out of the margins.

abstract: Gendered language has been a topic of study for centuries. The most recent efforts to promote inclusive language have been championed by parents, teachers, and social reformers over the last thirty years. Replicating in part a research study that was done over thirty years ago, this study examines what effects have taken place in children's perceptions of male and female roles in regards to specific activities and occupations and how their perceptions compare to the current work force, what role children's literature has played in these changes, and what children's natural speech in describing personified animals can tell us about their subconscious gender labeling. The results were remarkable in two ways: native language evidently exudes little emphasis on pronoun choice, and children are more readily acceptable of gender equality than that portrayed in either Caldecott winning children's books or real life as seen through current labor statistics. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Curriculum and Instruction 2011

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work / L. Susan Williams / This study analyzes in-depth interviews with incarcerated girls and young women, as well as contributions from community actors, to assess coercive sexual environments (CSE) in non-urban areas. CSEs represent an area of limited research that spotlights spatial disadvantage and sexual exploitation of at-risk girls, generating long-lasting negative effects for young women such as sexual harassment, exploitation, and sexual violence. Little is known about how CSEs may increase risk for girls’ involvement in the criminal justice system; further, all previous CSE research has been conducted in urban areas. To address these voids, the current study takes place in a primarily rural state, representing social control mechanisms somewhat different from cityscapes. Using a multi-pronged conceptual model of gendered pathways, ecological factors, and feminist criminology, the project relies heavily on stories from incarcerated girls and women. It identifies gender-specific mechanisms that perpetuate disadvantage and violence, examining how such apparatus may create a pipeline into the justice system. Tracing participants’ community roots, the study further gathers structural and cultural characteristics of the locale, assessing social control practices as reported by local professionals. Results confirm existence of CSEs in rural areas, which may produce negative outcomes and establish direct and indirect connections between young women and the justice system. Non-urban CSEs reveal origins common to those found in cities; patriarchy is identified as accounting for emergence of CSEs regardless of populous. The maintenance of such mechanisms, however, appear to be somewhat unique in rural communities; family name, a heavily-gendered veneer of idyllic but [un]safe milieux, and an absence of (and community reluctance to seek) vital services for abused girls and women are revealed as CSE characteristics in the areas of this study. Further, the current study challenges literature proclaiming solely positive results from high levels of collective efficacy, finding that strong collective efficacy in non-urban areas gathers close insider ties, but “outsiders,” which includes girls identified in this research, are defined quickly and deeply, placing them in significant peril. Policy recommendations include trauma-informed services in rural communities, coupled with education on characteristics associated with CSEs. While this research underscores over-incarceration of girls, it also suggests stop-gap approaches that address unique needs of young women in the justice system. Finally, recommendations for future CSE studies are offered.

Despite the picture portraying the U.S as a western, democratic and equal country, the U.S military has faced several downfalls when it comes to its female force, especially in relation to sexual assault. This study poses the question of how can western ‘model countries’ such as the U.S, promote democracy when its military institution seem to miss one of the central pillars to a democratic society that is equality. Furthermore, the study seeks to dive further into the military culture of the U.S military in order to understand if women adjust to the military culture or if the military culture adjusts to the influx of women. By examining narratives of male and female soldiers and veterans, who tell their stories online, this research is conducted as a case study, using Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital and Judith Butler’s theory of performative gender as an analytical tool in order to recontextualize the findings and gain a further understanding of the military culture from an inside perspective. In conclusion, the study essentially confirms the notion of the military constituting a male centered culture, as well as a crowd oriented culture, which contributes to females adjusting to the culture rather than it adjusting to the influx of women. In addition to this, gender equality is perceived as something applied by actors from the outside when it is convenient or solely talked about with respect to physical capabilities. Ultimately, research in relation to the U.S military needs to include a focus on culture in order for it to change and become gender equal.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Psychological Sciences / Patrick Knight / Recruiters and recruitment materials can signal to job seekers certain aspects of the organization which may affect how attractive the organization appears as a potential employer (signaling theory; Rynes, Bretz, & Gerhart, 1991). Some signals received during recruitment can indicate that social-based inequalities and hierarchies may exist (social dominance theory; Sidanius & Pratto, 1999). It is possible that women might perceive themselves as part of a subordinate group in fields where they are underrepresented, such as the areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The current research examines participant gender and the effects of using traditionally feminine words, masculine words, or neutral words in recruitment material on participants’ ratings of STEM program attractiveness and perceptions of institutional belonging. Furthermore, one’s goal orientation can influence the type of goal one is attracted to and whether it will be adopted; the current research looks at the effects of one’s goal orientation and how that is related to the person’s efficacy regarding STEM recruitment materials (Elliott & Dweck, 1988). Additionally, a goal orientation intervention was conducted in an attempt to influence participants’ situational learning goal orientations and measured efficacy. While the gendered wording of the recruitment material did not influence participants’ ratings of attraction and perceived belongingness, women rated the STEM recruitment material as more attractive than men. Additionally, participants’ learning goal orientation was found to have a significant influence on their measured efficacy. The results of this research have implications for recruiting female applicants to STEM programs/careers and suggestions for organizational interventions and best practices in order to positively affect job outcomes.

In the welfare state classification in which Sweden is found housing is not fully included as a key element which implies some difficulties when analyzing equality in the Swedish housing market. Furthermore, the Swedish housing market is shifting towards becoming more marketoriented which has indicated that housing is becoming more of an individual responsibility rather than a key element supplied from the state. When it comes to the Swedish gender equality work this needs to be further problematized as it has become a norm in Swedish policy that does not reflect reality. The purpose of this study is therefore to analyze if and how the aspect of gender equality is incorporated in the work with the public housing market as well as if there are different views towards the subject in the study area of Västerbotten County. By using a short survey and stakeholder interviews, data has been collected providing empirical data regarding gender equality in relation to the public housing market across the study area. The result shows some uncertainties and different views towards the subject of gender equality in relation to the public housing market across the municipalities in Västerbotten County. These uncertainties take form as some informants does not fully understand how gender equality and the public housing market is connected to each other and as there seem to be a lack of information which needs to spread within the municipalities. Furthermore, the informants problematize some underlying norms when planning for housing that needs to be reconsidered in order to create inclusiveness in the public housing market across the county. Otherwise, the planning process might end up creating a future exclusion of those not fitting into these norms. It is therefore important to always view the gender equality work as a continuous process. / Bostadsmarknadsanalys över Västerbottens län 2018