Women, murder and femininity : gender representations of women who kill.

Abstract

This book examines how women who kill have been perceived in terms of their gender, exploring how murder by women is seen as especially transgressive, and examining the impact this has on how women who kill are viewed. The study focuses on murders by women that are considered to be particularly unusual. Lizzie Seal develops a typology of five main representations of such women, including the 'masculine woman' and the 'witch', and uses it in order to analyse specific causes. The book covers well known examples such as Myra Hindley, Rose West, Lizzie Borden and Aileen Wuornos, as well as presenting original research into cases from mid twentieth-century England and Wales, arguing that portrayals of women who kill can shed light on the hopes, fears and anxieties of the wider culture.