This thesis examines the representations of gender and femininity on the television series Deadly Women. Each episode deals with three real-life cases of female murderers, each organized around the theme of the particular episode. The three chosen case representations were analyzed through a critical gender studies theoretical lens. The specific theories utilized were Judith Butler’s (1990, 1993) performativity theory, R.W. Connell’s (1995, 2002) notion of multiple masculinities and femininities, Judith Halberstam’s (1998) notion of female masculinity, and Ann Lloyd’s (1995) doubly deviant, doubly damned hypothesis. The cases analyzed were Aileen Wuornos (“Predators”, Season 2 (2008), episode 6), Jill Coit (“Fortune Hunters”, Season 4 (2010), episode 3), and Ashley Humphrey (“Dangerous Liaisons”, Season 4 (2010), episode 4). These three cases are viewed as particular performatives of violent transgressions of the social norm regarding ‘appropriate’ femininity. Aileen Wuornos’ representation replicates conventional understandings of female killers, in (re)producing the notion of the ‘monstrous’ predatory femininity of such women. Her “monsterization” (Morrissey, 2003) is often juxtaposed with testimony to Wuornos’ own troubled background. Wuornos’ own victimhood, however, is never portrayed in a manner that would condone her serial murders. The latter two cases provide alternative ways of understanding and discussing female killers. Jill Coit performs a version of (deadly) female masculinity (c.f. Halberstam, 1998), killing one husband while disguised in oversize men’s clothing and a clearly fake handlebar moustache. Finally, Ashley Humphrey performs a version of dangerous violent racialized hegemonic masculinity (Connell, 1995, 2002) and of victimized femininity.

This research uses trial data to extend previous research by Stead and Howard-Payne (2012) to examine discourse regarding Nicolette Lotter, a convicted female killer, and to proffer a preliminary theory of discursive networks. A discursive analytic approach to, and a Foucauldian Feminist interpretation of, the data was adopted to compare and contrast discursive constructions of the subject produced within the legal and media context in the interest of understanding how hegemonic understandings of femininity continue to be (re)produced in contemporary society. This report argues for a distinction between discursive construction and discursive practice, where the former is show to operate in production of the latter. It suggests further that the discourse produced in the legal context and the discourse produced in the media context align to fashion a discourse network where convergence occurs at the level of construction and divergence occurs at the level of practice. Such a discourse network arising in relation to Nicolette Lotter is shown to foster an understanding of the female killer which contributes to the fortification of gender prescriptions which are of patriarchal orientation in the interests of preserving male dominance and female subjugation.

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Kvinnor begår färre våldsbrott än män, och endast en tiondel av alla mord begås av kvinnor. Detta speglas i att relativt lite forskning om kvinnor som begår dödligt våld har genomförts. När kvinnor dödar är det ofta en nuvarande, eller före detta, intim partner som faller offer. Men varför dödar kvinnor en person som de tidigare valt att spendera sitt liv med? Finns det några likheter mellan dessa kvinnor? Denna systematiska litteraturstudie visar att en majoritet av de kvinnor som tar livet av sin partner, gör det efter att ha utsatts för fysiskt och psykiskt våld av sin partner under lång tid. Tidigare partnervåld, och den överhängande risken att utsättas för ännu en episod av grovt våld, leder till att dessa kvinnor lever med ständig skräck, rädsla och ångest. Många av dessa kvinnor upplever även en känsla av isolation, vilket förstärks av att mannen ofta förbjuder dem att arbeta utanför hemmet. Kvinnor som dödar sin partner gör det ofta i, vad de själva anser är, självförsvar. Många av dessa kvinnor menar att de dödade sin partner för att de var tvungna. Hade de inte gjort det hade de själva förmodligen blivit mördade. / Women commit fewer violent crimes than men, with only one tenth of all murders committed by females. This is reflected in the fact that relatively little research has been conducted about women who kill. When women kill, the victim is often a current or former intimate partner. But why do some women kill an individual whom they have previously chosen to spend their life with? Are there any similarities between these women? This systematic literature review shows that a majority of women who take the life of an intimate partner, do it after having been subjected to physical and psychological violence by their partner for a long period of time. Former partner violence, and the imminent risk of being subjected to yet another episode of serious violence, leads to these women living with constant fear, horror and anxiety. Many of these women also experience a sense of isolation, which is reinforced by the fact they their partner often forbids them to work outside of the home. Women who kill their intimate partner often do so in, what they feel is, self-defence. Many of these women say that they killed their partner because they had to. Had they not killed him, they themselves would probably have been murdered.

I takt med att intresset för true crime- och infotainment i media växer sig större ökar behovet av att studera nyhetsmediernas påverkan på skapandet av könsbaserade maktrelationer. Syftet med denna studie är att få en ökad förståelse för hur maktrelationer produceras genom tryckt nyhetsmedias rapportering kring kvinnor som mördar. Fokus ligger på att identifiera vilka diskursiva strategier och uteslutningsmekanismer som används för att skapa dessa maktrelationer. Studien genomförs genom en foucaultiansk diskursanalys på 38 artiklar från svensk tryckt nyhetsförmedling som berör kvinnor som mördat. Vidare används ett teoretiskt ramverk bestående av genusperspektiv samt gestaltningsteori för att bidra till en djupare förståelse för analysens resultat. Studien fann att de diskursiva strategier som primärt används var klassificeringar, språkbruk och anspråk på galenskap. Genom dessa strategier identifierade studien vidare två diskursiva utrymmen för kvinnor som mördar - den “goda” och den “onda” mördaren. Studien fann att dessa två utrymmen var starkt kopplade till hur mördarens femininitet var porträtterad, där de “goda” blev porträtterade som feminina till skillnad från de “onda”. / As the true crime and infotainment industries grow larger, the need to study the news media's impact on the creation of gendered power relations grow larger. The aim of this study is to gain a deeper understanding of how power relations are produced by news media in their reporting on female killers. Of special interest is identifying which discursive strategies and mechanisms of exclusion that are used in order create these power relations. The study achieves this by analyzing 38 articles from Swedish news media about female murderers using a Foucauldian discourse analysis. Furthermore, a theoretical framework consisting of gender theory and framing theory is used to further understand the findings. The study found that the main discursive strategies that were used were categorization, rhetorical strategies and similaes, and references to madness. From these strategies the study identified two discursive spaces for female murderers to populate - the ‘good’ murderer and the ‘evil’ one. These two spaces were found to be strictly linked with how the femininity of the murderer was portrayed, where the ‘good’ were portrayed as feminine and the ‘evil’ weren’t.

Syftet med studien är att skapa en djupare förståelse för hur manliga- och kvinnliga mördare porträtteras i nyhetsmedia samt de eventuella skillnader som finns i porträtteringen. Fokus ligger på att se om det finns ett tydligt mönster för hur dessa fyra mördare porträtteras i media samt skillnader mellan en manlig mördare och en kvinnlig mördare som har begått snarlika brott. Tidigare forskning har visat på att det finns skillnader i porträtteringen när det kommer till manliga förövare och kvinnliga förövare. Man har kunnat se att kvinnliga förövare smutskastas mer av media än manliga förövare. För att undersöka porträtteringen av mördare i media utgår denna studie utifrån en kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Materialet i studien består av 40 svenska nyhetsartiklar varav 10 artiklar på vardera mördaren från olika svenska tidningar. Detta material har sedan analyserats med hjälp en innehållsanalys. Resultatet från analysen visar att kvinnliga mördare porträtteras i media utefter det brott de har begått samt deras normbrytande beteende. När det kommer till de manliga mördarna så porträtteras dessa endast utefter det brott som de har begått. Slutsatsen som kan dras av studien är att det finns ett mönster hur man porträtterar manliga mördare mot hur man porträtterar kvinnliga mördare. Kvinnliga mördares beteenden och karaktär anses vara mer avvikande vid denna typ av brott än manliga mördares. Vilket gör att man kan dra likheter från tidigare forskning och därav se ett mönster i porträtteringen i media. Svenska nyhetstidningar har en tendens att beskriva kvinnliga mördare på ett komplext sätt genom att porträttera deras brott samt normbrytande beteende vilket leder till ett större fokus och mer skriverier kring kvinnliga mördare i nyhetsmedia än manliga mördare. / The aim of this study is to create a deeper understanding about how male- and female murderers are depicted in the news and to see if there is any difference in the depiction. The focus is to see if there is a pattern between four murderers, two female and two males, and how they are depicted in the media. We also want to see if there is a difference between male and female murderers who committed similar crimes. Previous research shows that there is a difference in how the depiction of male and female murderers. Female offenders are more often befouled then their male counterpart. To examine how the media depict the murderers this study originates from a qualitative content analysis. The material that we base our study on is 40 Swedish articles from different media, ten articles on each murderer from different newspapers. The results we found were that the female murderers are portrayed by media by their crime and norm-breaking behavior. The male murderers are portrayed only after their crime. The conclusion is that we can see a pattern in how media depict male and female murderers and that there is a differs in-between male and female murderers. Swedish newspapers tend to describe female murderers in a more complex way by depicting their crimes and norm braking behavior which leads to a bigger focus and more articles revolving female murderers in the news then male murderers.