Abstract
The issue of wife beating was a common topic of political discourse in 19th century America. After the turn-of-the-century, however, the issue dropped from public view and resurfaced only when contemporary feminists reframed the problem. My paper explains why this issue disappeared from, and then returned to, the political scene. I use contemporary frame analysis to analyze the specific frames to interpret wife beating that appeared in political discourse and tie them to cultural and institutional developments as well as to the work of specific social movements. in particular, I argue that the moral significance each frame gave -or denied- to wife beating was key to the issue's political status.
Journal Title
Iowa Journal of Communication
Volume
38
Issue
1
First Page
27
Last Page
54
Language
en
File Format
application/pdf
Recommended Citation
Arnold, Gretchen
(2006)
"The Social Construction of Wife Beating in Political Discourse,"
Iowa Journal of Communication: Vol. 38:
No.
1, Article 5.
Available at:
https://scholarworks.uni.edu/ijc/vol38/iss1/5
Copyright
©2006 Iowa Communication Association
