Prologue to Violence: Child Abuse, Dissociation, and Crime

by Abby Stein

Book Overview

Despite mounting references to the "transgenerational transmission of violence," we still lack a compelling understanding of the linkage between the interpersonal violence of early life and the criminal violence of adulthood. In Prologue to Violence, Abby Stein draws on the gripping narratives of 65 incarcerated subjects and extensive material from law enforcement files to remedy this lacuna in both the forensic and psychodynamic literature. In...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1138005800
• ISBN13: 9781138005808
• Release Date: August 2014
• Publisher: Routledge
• Length: 166 Pages

Customer Reviews

A truly original study, brilliantly written

It's rare to find a work of deep scholarship in the social sciences that both shifts the ways in which we think about fundamental psycho-pathologies AND engages even the uninitiated reader with fine prose. Dr. Stein has managed this feat in a book that is sure to prompt many energetic conversations about the precursors to a "criminal" personality. Particularly interesting is Dr. Stein's examination of--and challenge to--the ideas of psychopathy and sociopathy both in children who have been abused and in the adults they become. This is a remarkable study whose readers will be fascinated and, frequently, surprised by Dr. Stein's conclusions.