Criminal Woman, the Prostitute, and the Normal Woman (review)

First published in Italian in 1893, La donna delinquente, la prostituta e la donna normale became a classic text in criminal anthropology and was in fact the only study of the causes of female crime for decades. The present work is the first English translation of the book since 1895, and, significantly, it is far more

comprehensive than the earlier edition, which had omitted critical sections on prostitutes and "normal" women. Also translated into English for the first time are Cesare Lombroso's observations on the sexual characteristics of female criminals, which will be particularly interesting to historians in a number of fields.

At the heart of this work is Lombroso's effort to demonstrate that criminality has a genetic or biological component that can be documented and proven by locating shared physical abnormalities among female criminals. These abnormalities are characteristics of more-primitive humans, and thus those who break the law are throwbacks to earlier stages in human evolution. To prove this theory, Lombroso collected data on women both by conducting his own research and by compiling information from other studies. His text begins with an examination of "normal" women, documenting the inferiority of women and the superiority of men. Women's physical degeneracy produces the "basic immorality latent in all women" (p. 199). Lombroso relies on sources here that range from correspondence with medical practitioners to his own casual observations, and even Italian aphorisms: "To demonstrate that lying is habitual and almost physiological in women would be superfluous, since it is confirmed even by popular sayings" (p. 77). The second section of the book includes "Female Criminology," describing crimes common to the female human, as well as a brief but ambitious exploration of "Crime in the Animal World."

In the third section Lombroso turns to the "Pathological Anatomy and Anthropometry of Criminal Woman and the Prostitute." This territory will be familiar to historians of late nineteenth-century science. Lombroso examines criminal women and prostitutes from head to toe—from the shape of their heads to their propensity for prehensile feet, and much in between—identifying the most prevalent anomalies they share. In the fourth section, "Biology and Psychology of Female Criminals and Prostitutes," he considers a range of psychological characteristics as well as traits such as strength, reflexes, and the relative acuity of the five senses. Also explored in this section are sexual sensitivity and the disposition to lesbianism. Lombardo observes that "some female born criminals and prostitutes have more sexual sensitivity than normal women," but he remarks that "they are far less sensitive sexually than men imagine when they themselves are sexually aroused" (p. 171). Though photographs appear throughout the book, those in this section are particularly revealing, as are a handful of sketches of tattoos that Lombroso observed on French, German, and Argentinian prostitutes.

Though modern readers will find many of Lombroso's conclusions anachronistic and troubling, he viewed his work as part of a modern project that employed science to overcome irrationality. He notes that he began his study believing anthropometry to be "an ark of salvation from the metaphysical, a priori systems dear to all those engaged on the study of man" (p. 107). Moreover, his conclusions partly inspired liberal reforms in criminal justice. Late in life Lombroso campaigned for alternatives to prison, particularly for women, based on a belief that many crimes stemmed from social pressures.

The introduction to this text, written by the translators, makes this book accessible to those unfamiliar with Lombroso's work, situating his study in an intellectual and political context. Nicole Rafter and Mary Gibson also dig deep into Lombroso's reasoning, asking how he resolved contradictions in his logic and overcame research challenges. A brief discussion of Lombroso's connections to Havelock Ellis and Richard von Kraft-Ebing adds further...