The Gender in Stories: How War Stories and Police Narratives Shape Masculine Police Culture

• In Event: Narrative Criminology II: Gender and Psychosocial Dynamics

Abstract

The current research examines the role of storytelling and narrative development in police culture as it relates to gendered aspects of law enforcement organizations. Ethnographic interviews with 28 officers in three Midwest communities indicates that women in law enforcement are frequently viewed through a gendered lens and that police storytelling appears an important context for understanding assumptions about gender in police culture. The types of stories explored in this paper—flow of action, war stories, and gender narratives—provide an important, interrelated context for understanding the production and reproduction of masculinity in modern policing. This research posits that by paying close attention to the narratives of police officers we can gain insight into the maintenance of gendered police culture. The findings also build on the growing foundation for narrative inquiry in criminology.

Authors

• Don L. Kurtz, Kansas State University

• Lindsey Upton, Tennessee Tech University