NCJ Number
129922
Journal
Symbolic Interaction Volume: 13 Issue: 1 Dated: (1990) Pages: 103-122
Date Published
1990
Length
20 pages
Annotation
An interactional analysis of victim assignment practices respects the integrity of social life as an interpretive process, thus enriching an understanding of how persons become victims.
Abstract
Victimization is defined as the social processes through which persons come to be known and understood as victims. Victimization is used as a procedure for deflecting responsibility, assigning causes, specifying responses and remedies, and accounting for failure. Victimization is a rhetoric for preserving good intentions and ideals by discounting failures in their realization. It does not deny failure; rather, it invites such a conclusion while maintaining persons' integrity. A sense of competence is maintained by portraying persons as dissatisfied, yet helpless in relation to the circumstances that work against their success. There are four other issues addressed by interactionist research on victimization: (1) the relation between victimization and social problems claims-making; (2) the effect of victimization; (3) the sources of victimization; and (4) the consequences of victimization for persons so portrayed. Interactionally-oriented victimology directs analysis to the reality construction procedures through which "victims" are created. 7 notes and 49 references (Author abstract modified)