The gender-based impact of stand your ground laws: a triangulated analysis of homicide trends and legal cases

This research award will support two interns to work as part of an international research partnership between Dalhousie University, Harvard University, the University of Oxford, and the University of Pennsylvannia. We aim to investigate: (1) the impacts that expanding civilian rights and ability to use deadly force in self-defense across the United States have had on rates of intimate partner homicide and (2) how self-defense cases involving violence between intimate partners (the most common form of violence against women) have been treated in the justice system depending on variations in state laws. Each intern will work on activities that support one of these two aims. We expect that this work will result in two peer-reviewed publications and a funding application that will support a larger investigation of not just whether changing self-defense laws impacts violence against women but also for whom and how, to better inform legal and policy reform that reduces (rather than exacerbates) social inequalities.

Faculty Supervisor:

Alexa Yakubovich

Student:

Partner:

Harvard University;University of Oxford

Discipline:

Sociology

Sector:

Education

University:

Dalhousie University

Program: