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19 Critical Criminology 1 (2011)

handle is hein.journals/ctlcrm19 and id is 1 raw text is: Crit Crim (2011) 19:1-14 DOI 10.1007/s10612-010-9101-0 Qualitative Research and Intersectionality Adam Trahan Published online: 23 April 2010 © Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010 Abstract Much of the extant criminological literature on the relationships between race, class, gender, and crime has treated these demographic characteristics as isolated, inde- pendent variables. More recent theorizing has called our attention to fact that these con- structs are not autonomous. Instead, people's identity lies at the intersection of race, class, and gender and it is the combination of these constructs that often shapes people's experiences with the criminal justice system and other social structures. It is well-docu- mented, however, that purely quantitative methodologies are not well suited to studying intersecionality. The findings of qualitative research have lent a greater understanding to the intersection of race, class, gender, and crime. The appropriateness of certain methodological frameworks and the thematic contributions of qualitative research to intersectionality are discussed. The concept that would give rise to the intersectionality movement first emerged in a critique of the feminist literature. In Ain't I a Woman, bell Hooks (1981) took aim at feminist scholars' proclivity at the time for comparing the discrimination experienced by women under patriarchy to the subjugation of Blacks' in America. This analogy, she stated, implies that all women are white and all Blacks are men. Although the term intersec- tionality itself would not appear for eight more years (Crenshaw 1989), hook's work prompted scholars across a range of disciplines to deconstruct race, class, and gender typologies. In particular, the proponents of intersectionality argued that the custom of theorizing and researching race, class, and gender as independent constructs that exert independent influences on outcome variables is not grounded in reality (Baca Zinn and Thornton Dill 1996; Barak 1998; Crenshaw 1991; Daly and Chesney-Lind 1988a, b). A. Trahan (E) Department of Criminal Justice, University of North Texas, 273K, Chilton Hall, 1155 Union Circle #305130, Denton, TX 76203-5017, USA e-mail: Adam.Trahan@unt.edu Springer

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