Mass Shootings and Intimate Partner Violence: A Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis

This Major Research Paper is a feminist critical discourse analysis of news articles pertaining to three mass shootings in the United States in which an intimate partner of the perpetrator was targeted and a history of domestic violence was known. The aim of this study is to identify and examine the dominant discourses employed by the media when reporting on mass shootings that are rooted in gender-based violence. I uncovered three discourses: 1) the continued portrayal of intimate partner violence as a private issue; 2) the emphasis on the shock and disbelief held by community members; and 3) the construction of perpetrators as deviant that is detached from IPV. The purpose of this study is that through naming and understanding these discourses at play, social workers can better engage in the critical prevention, intervention and postvention work of addressing gun violence and its inextricable link to intimate partner violence.