Intimate partner violence and Mexican American gang girls

Intimate partner violence remains a serious public health and social problem in the U.S. While street violence and rape make the news across our respective communities, violence experienced by women with their intimate partner, family members and family friends is far more common, yet given less attention, analysis, and meaningful measured societal response. Earlier research and key publications have focused on older women, mainly those in marriages, and have overlooked young adolescent to young adult females, and also minorities. Valdez reverses this trend, focusing on Mexican-American females who are particularly vulnerable to violence victimization by virtue of the environmental, economic, and cultural factors associated with life in the Mexican-American barrio. As this manuscript emphasizes, street gang affiliations increase the risks of sexual violence and IPV among this population especially in socially and economically disadvantaged urban communities. Beyond Risk also addresses how social and cultural factors are critical in understanding the etiology of intimate partner violence in this country's rapidly growing segment of the population.-- From publisher description.