Dissertation Presentation: 35 Years of Intimate Partner Homicide Discourse

School of Social Work PhD Candidate Amy R. Dorman presents her dissertation, "Thirty-Five Years of Intimate Partner Homicide Discourse by Minnesota’s Statewide Domestic Violence Coalition, 1989-2023."

Advisor: Lynette M. Renner, PhD, MSW

Committee: Jessica Toft, PhD, MSW; Mimi Choy-Brown, PhD, MSW; David Weerts PhD, MS (Organizational Leadership, Policy, and Development)

When: Thursday, May 15, 2025 at 10 am

Where: Peters Hall Room 155 and on Zoom 

Dissertation abstract: Dozens of Minnesotans are killed every year in intimate partner homicides (IPH). Minnesota’s statewide domestic violence coalition (SDVC) is the only entity to systematically collect and present data on this social issue through their annual IPH reports. How a social issue is framed impacts the way the issue is understood by policymakers and the public, influencing how and to what extent the social issue is addressed.

IPH is often mischaracterized in the news media in the United States, and little research has been conducted around how other policy actors, like SDVCs, frame IPH in their social issue discourse. This study used case study methods to better understand the changes to Minnesota’s SDVC’s framing of IPH as a social issue over time, and what micro, mezzo, and macro factors may have influenced those changes.

Analysis was conducted across multiple data sources: the 35 annual IPH reports published by Minnesota’s SDVC, the SDVC’s archival collection from the University of Minnesota Social Welfare Archives, timeline mapping of sociohistorical events, and qualitative interviews with nine of the report authors. Within-case and cross-case analyses were employed.

The study identified the key change to the IPH reports over time as a shift from a mainstream feminist frame with a criminal legal focus to an intersectional feminist frame with a public health orientation. Report authors were identified as the most frequent and strongest influences to changes to the IPH reports, within the context of a collaborative organizational structure at the SDVC that aligned with feminist organization principles. Additional within-case and cross-case changes and influences are presented, and implications for future framing of IPH as a social issue in Minnesota are discussed.