This work is a sociologically based analysis of the day care ritual abuse panic in America. It introduces the concept of moral panic and analyzes its relevance to the ritual abuse scare, explores the ideological, political, economic, and professional forces that fomented the panic, discusses the McMartin Preschool case as the incident that brought attention to satanic menaces and children, and examines the dialect between the various interest groups that stirred up and spread the moral panic and the day care providers accused of ritual abuse. Also covered are the popular culture representations of day care ritual abuse, the diffusion of the scare to areas overseas, the institutionally symbolic and ideologically contradictory social ends of the panic, and the outcomes of the panic in various settings. The book ends with a discussion of moral panic theory and how it needs to be changed for a complex, multi-mediated postmodern culture, and what lessons can be learned from the scare.
FREE Two-Day Shipping for Students. Learn more |
Book Description
In the United States during the early 1980s, hundreds of day care providers were accused of sexually abusing their young charges in satanic rituals that included blood drinking, cannibalism, and human sacrifice. The panic surrounding the ritual abuse of children has spread quickly to Canada, Europe, and Australasia, and its rapid dispersion has been unimpeded by international investigations that found no evidence to corroborate the allegations and warned that a moral panic was thrusting them into professional public attention.
Special Offers and Product Promotions
- Buy $50 in qualifying physical textbooks, get $5 in Amazon MP3 Credit. Here's how (restrictions apply)
Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Mary de Young, a professor of sociology at Grand Valley State University, is also the author of The Ritual Abuse Controversy: An Annotated Bibliography (2002, $49.95). She lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Outstanding Analysis,
By Alastair Foxx (Manchester, England) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Day Care Ritual Abuse Moral Panic (Paperback)
This is an outstanding book on a horrible decade in American and Western European culture. DeYoung's sociological analysis of the American day care cases uses moral panic theory as its framework; in analysing the cases, she also refreshes an important but much abused and timeworn theory of collective behavior. She includes a brilliant chapter on the spread of the moral panic abroad, demonstrating her broad international savvy about these cases. The book is splendidly written,often witty, always insightful, but very accessible. It should appeal to a wide audience. I recommend it with enthusiasm.
2 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
The title gives it away...,
This review is from: The Day Care Ritual Abuse Moral Panic (Paperback)
Poorly researched by using carefully selected data to support the position while excluding all documented evidence to the contrary. Complete lack of anything resembling objectivity.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
Inside This Book
(learn more)
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items. |
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
