Violence in Everyday Life

It is a truism in criminology that violence and its consequences cannot be understood outside the prisms of gender and sexuality. By making these fundamental starting points, Javaid provides an analysis that is perceptive, empathic and reflexive. A thought-provoking introduction for students and teachers. * David Gadd, The University of Manchester, UK *
At last, the book that brings to light how both hegemonic masculinities and heteronormativity impacts all facets of everyday violence—from rape and sexual assault, to murder, to homophobic and transphobic violence, to violence in the global South. The book is clearly written, intellectually meticulous, and wide-ranging. Should be required reading for all scholars of violence! * James W. Messerschmidt, University of Southern Maine, USA *
The intersecting worlds of sexuality and gender offer potent sites for the generation of conflicting emotions: pleasure and danger, love and hate, dominance and submission, desire and fear. It is not surprising that violence can tear across these feelings and shape and disfigure so many lives. This book delves deeply into this complex web of experience and affect and offers invaluable and clarifying insights into the violence of everyday life. In its coda it goes beyond this to offer a raw and deeply moving account of the author’s own experience of violence. Dispassionate analysis and passionate lived experience combine to make this book an invaluable guide to the endemic nature of violence, and the possibilities of resistance, survival and redemption. * Jeffrey Weeks, London South Bank University *
This fascinating work offers new and insightful perspectives on the study of hegemonic masculinity and violence. By adopting a framework that views violence as being collective and institutional as well as individual, Aliraza Javaid has crafted a book which is genuinely groundbreaking in its scope and vision. Drawing on global perspectives, this work offers carefully crafted and nuanced arguments on the interrelationships between masculinity, power, sexualities and violence, making it a must-read for academics, students and practitioners working in these areas. * Jon Garland, University of Surrey *
Comprehensive, thought-provoking and beautifully written, this book offers new ways of thinking about themes of power, gender, sexuality and violence. In doing so, it raises a series of important questions which feel utterly relevant to the times that we are in. * Neil Chakraborti, University of Leicester *
Aliraza Javaid assembles data about rape, murder and assault, in situations ranging from intra-family violence to homophobic violence, anti-trans violence, serial killings, and more. The importance of the power dynamics of masculinities emerges clearly; a distinctive feature is a chapter about the personal experience of being targeted. This work is a valuable introduction to the complex and difficult issues around gender-based and sexual violence. * Raewyn Connell, University of Sydney. *
A truly original and illuminating discussion of theory and evidence about violence. Javaid adopts insights from contemporary masculinities theory and skillfully applies these to the analysis and explanation of a series of topical issues in violence to reject limited, totalizing, and conventional divisions often made between the experiences of violence. * Stephen Tomsen, Western Sydney University *
The question of men and masculinity is at the centre of public debate and politics across the globe. Passions run high as gender power is at stake. Javaid’s highly original Violences in Everyday Life: Power, Gender and Sexuality should prove an indispensable guide to navigate this confusing gender and sexual terrain. * Steven Seidman, University at Albany SUNY *