Reform and resistance : gender, delinquency, and America's first juvenile court /

This historical study examines America's first juvenile court, associated institutions, and female delinquency in late 19th- and early 20th-century Chicago. Knupfer (Purdue Univ.), whose Toward a Tenderer Humanity and a Nobler Womanhood examined African American women's clubs and delinquent girls in Illinois, provides fascinating and original information on the definitions, causes, and cures for female delinquency. Initial chapters deal with female delinquency and reform, psychomedical models of delinquency, and the helping professions; later chapters discuss the courts and detention and reform institutions for delinquent girls. She shows how club women and women professionals took an active role in starting and running these programs. An impressive range of primary sources such as institutional records, annual reports from the court, sociological studies, case reports from psychologists and social workers, and narratives from the girls themselves is widely cited. Three of the chapters are revisions of articles. Victoria Getis's The Juvenile Court and the Progressives (Univ. of Illinois, 2000) nicely complements this book with material on Chicago organizations, politics, and reformers. A necessary purchase for research collections on criminal justice, social welfare, women's history, or Chicago. Mary Jane Brustman, Univ. at Albany Lib., NY (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.