Ellen Louise Pence (April 15, 1948 – January 6, 2012) was an American scholar and a social

activist Activism consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived common good. Forms of activism range from mandate build ...

. She co-founded the Duluth Domestic Abuse Intervention Project, an inter-agency collaboration model used in all 50 states in the U.S. and over 17 countries. A leader in both the battered

women's movement The feminist movement, also known as the women's movement, refers to a series of social movements and political campaigns for radical and liberal reforms on women's issues created by inequality between men and women. Such issues are women's ...

and the emerging field of

institutional ethnography Institutional ethnography (IE) is an alternative approach of studying and understanding the social. IE has been described as an alternative philosophical paradigm, sociology, or (qualitative) research method. IE explores the social relations that ...

, she was the recipient of numerous awards including the Society for the Study of Social Problems Dorothy E. Smith Scholar Activist Award (2008) for significant contributions in a career of activist research.

Background

Born in

Minneapolis, Minnesota Minneapolis is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 429,954 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the state's List of cities in Minnesota, most populous city. Locat ...

, Pence graduated from St. Scholastica in Duluth with a B.A. in arts. She was active in institutional change work for battered women since 1975, and helped found the Domestic Abuse Intervention Project in 1980. She is credited with creating the Duluth Model of intervention in domestic violence cases, Coordinated Community Response (CCR), which uses an interagency collaborative approach involving police, probation, courts and human services in response to domestic abuse. The primary goal of CCR is to protect victims from ongoing abuse. She earned her Ph.D. in sociology from the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university whose main campus is located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded by ...

in 1996. She used

as a method of organizing community groups to analyze problems created by institutional intervention in families. She founded Praxis International in 1998 and was the chief author and architect of the Praxis Institutional Audit, a method of identifying, analyzing and correcting institutional failures to protect people drawn into legal and human service systems because of violence and poverty.

Activism and research

Pence's focus was on legislative efforts, legal reform projects, shelter and advocacy program development, and training programs for judges, probation officers, law enforcement officers, and human service providers. Pence was the author of several educational manuals and curricula for classes for battered women, men who batter, and law enforcement officers. She co-authored two books: ''Educational Groups for Men Who Batter: The Duluth Model'' and ''Coordinated Community Response to Domestic Violence: Lessons from the Duluth Model''. Until late 2011 she was the executive director of Praxis International. and worked with a national team of experts to run an advocacy learning center to strengthen advocacy programs' skills and capacities in their work toward ending

violence against women Violence against women (VAW), also known as gender-based violence (GBV) or sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), violent, violence primarily committed by Man, men or boys against woman, women or girls. Such violence is often considered hat ...

Death

Pence died of

breast cancer Breast cancer is a cancer that develops from breast tissue. Signs of breast cancer may include a Breast lump, lump in the breast, a change in breast shape, dimpling of the skin, Milk-rejection sign, milk rejection, fluid coming from the nipp ...

on January 6, 2012, aged 63, in

St. Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (often abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 311,527, making it Minnesota's second-most populous city a ...

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pence, Ellen 1948 births 2012 deaths American sociologists American women sociologists Activists from Minneapolis University of Toronto alumni Deaths from breast cancer in Minnesota 20th-century American women academics 20th-century American academics