Drawing on his ethnographic research in rural areas of Kentucky, the author of this book presents a thorough look at the experiences of battered women in rural communities. Neil Websdale demonstrates how rural patriarchy and an insidious `ol' boy's network' of law enforcement and local politics sustains, reproduces and transforms the subordinate, vulnerable, isolated position of many rural women.

Taking into account that traditional patterns of intervention can often put women in isolated communities at further risk, the author recommends a coordinated multi-agency approach to rural battering, spearheaded by the agencies of state feminism.