Stacy Banwell

Dr Stacy Banwell BA, MA, PhD

Associate Professor of Criminology

Dr Stacy Banwell joined the School of Law at the University of Greenwich in September 2007.

Stacy completed both her undergraduate and postgraduate studies at the University of Wales, Bangor. Her thesis was based on women's subjective accounts of their violent behaviour. Stacy has subsequently published material relating to this work in the journal Feminist Criminology.

Law

Responsibilities within the university

  • Stacy is the Postgraduate Academic Portfolio Lead for Law and Criminology
  • Stacy was the BA Criminology programme leader for 4 years.
  • Stacy has been involved in a number of University-wide initiatives addressing recruitment, admissions and student welfare. She is currently the Programme Leader for the MSc Criminology, Gender and Sexualities

Stacy teaches on the following UG and PG modules:

  • Joint module leader: Crime in the City, crime and the State (Level 6 core and option)
  • Module leader: Women, Power, Crime and Justice (Level 6 option)
  • Feminist Criminological Research (Level 7 core)
  • Joint module leader: Academic Project (Level 7 core)

Awards

    • Outstanding Achievement in Research award at the Greenwich Research & Enterprise Awards 2021.
    • 2011: Early career researcher conference award University of Greenwich

Recognition

Dr Banwell is also part of the EU Horizon/UKRI project ‘Transformative Change for Biodiversity and Equity’ (TC4BE). The project aims to assess ‘the nexus of extraction, production, consumption, trade, and behaviour patterns and of climate change action on biodiversity in the context of transformative change.’

Dr Banwell is a member of an international consortium of Global Gag Rule (GGR) researchers, known as the ‘the GGR research working group.’ Led by CHANGE and Columbia University, the group is composed of researchers working in a diverse array of institutions who are conducting different types of research to document the impact of the GGR on health service provision and access.

Stacy is also affiliated with:

  • Centre for Communities and Social Justice (University of Greenwich)
  • International Editorial Advisory board for Third World Quarterly
  • Editorial board Frontiers Social Demography and Climate Change
  • Editorial board International and Public affairs
  • International: The Global Gag Rule Research Working Group
  • American Society of Criminology: division on women and crime
  • European Society of Criminology
  • European Network on Gender and Violence
  • British Society of Criminology Women, Crime and Criminal Justice Network
  • British Society of Criminology Green Criminology Research Network
  • Fellow of the Higher Education Authority
  • Greenwich Women's Network
  • Member of the Gender and Sexuality Pathway of the UBEL Doctoral training partnership

Research / Scholarly interests

Dr Stacy Banwell’s research interests include:

  • Gender and the violence(s) of war/armed conflict
  • Gender, climate change and atrocity crimes
  • Wartime rape and sexual violence
  • Gender and economic foreign policy in warzones
  • Conflict-related sexual violence and access to reproductive healthcare in crisis and humanitarian settings
  • Conflict-related sexual violence and reproductive violence against human and non-human animals
  • Multi-species justice

Many of these themes are explored in detail in her monograph 'Gender and the Violence(s) of War and Armed Conflict: More Dangerous to be a Woman?' Stacy produced a short animation to accompany the book and is available to watch here. She was also invited to appear on the ‘Emerald Podcast Series: Research that makes a difference’ to discuss this research. A recording of the podcast can be found here.

Drawing on historical and contemporary case studies, this book explores the violence(s) of war and armed conflict through a gendered lens. Gender-based violence, committed by and against both genders, within and beyond the conflict zone, are examined. The book explores the contexts in which war and armed conflict takes place, paying particular attention to, pre-war gender relations and local histories; gender and (sexualized) wartime violence; gender and the consequences of war/armed conflict, and gender and the global processes/polices that inform war and armed conflict.

In her second book - The War Against Nonhuman Animals A Non-Speciesist Understanding of Gendered Reproductive Violence – Stacy extends the work carried out for her first book and considers how nonhuman animals are also victims of conflict-related sexual and reproductive violence. The book argues that nonhuman animals should be granted legal personhood and treated as ‘protected persons’ rather than the property of ‘protected persons.’ The main argument is that War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity – rape, forced pregnancy and other acts of sexual violence – are being committed within the meat, egg and dairy industries. One of the main themes of the book is captured in this short animationStacy was also invited to appear on the Knowing Animals podcast to discuss the themes of the book. A recording of the podcast can be found here.

With colleagues Stacy has written a textbook on Sex and Crime. Drawing on original research and diverse scholarship from fields including public health, media studies, leisure studies, war studies, and deviance studies, this textbook provides wide ranging insights into the complexity of the relationship between sex and crime and why it matters. She is also one of the editors of The Emerald International Handbook of Feminist Perspectives on Women’s Acts of Violence

In 2014 Stacy's article 'Rape and sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo: A case study of Gender-based Violence' was included in an online article collection featuring the most downloaded articles published in Routledge Social Sciences journals in 2014. The collection features the top three most downloaded articles that were published and downloaded in 2014. This article has also been included in the 'Millennium Development Goal 3: Promote Gender Equality & Empower Women' collection.

Stacy's article 'Rassenschande, Genocide and the Reproductive Jewish Body: Examining the Use of Rape and Sexualized Violence Against Jewish Women During the Holocaust', has appeared in the top five article downloads in Journal of Modern Jewish Studies.

Key funded projects

Key funded projects

    • 2023-ongoing Co-PI: EU Horizon/UKRI project -Transformative Change for Biodiversity and Equity. Awarded £842, 740 working with partners from the Natural Resource Institute (University of Greenwich), the Netherlands, Finland, France, Colombia, Cameron and Kenya.
    • 2019: Principal investigator: Access to reproductive healthcare for female war-affected populations: A review of the Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance Policy under theTrump Administration. Awarded £5,000 (University of Greenwich).
    • 2017: Principal investigator: Access to safe abortion for survivors of wartime rape and sexual violence: A review of reproductive healthcare in humanitarian settings, particularly access to safe abortion. Awarded £3,330 (University of Greenwich).
    • 2015: Ministry of Justice funded research project on disproportionality in Prisons. Awarded £88,000. Commissioned by NOMS, The University of Greenwich, Ipswich and Suffolk Council for Racial Equality (ISCRE) and The Runnymede Trust worked in partnership to design, implement and evaluate the self-change intervention designed to reduce inequality outcomes in prison for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) prisoners.
    • Final report: 'Improving Outcomes for BAME prisoners to Improve Equality, Safety and Decency in Prison' (2016). Darrick Joliffe, Zubaida Haque, Debbie Weekes-Bernard, Sarah Adamson, Omar Khan, Stacy Banwell

Recent publications

    • Banwell, S.  (in press). Rape, sexual violence and forced pregnancy: The expressions and consequences of reproductive violence committed during the war against nonhuman animals. Animal Liberation. Open access.
    • Banwell, S. & Walliss, J. (forthcoming). ‘They have literally given up on life’: A review of the experiences of nonhuman animals subject to reproductive violence and coercion on factory and puppy farms. In Violence and Harm in the Animal Industrial Complex: Human-Animal Entanglements (eds). Hunnicutt, Mentor and Twine. Routledge.
    • Banwell, S. (2023). The War Against Nonhuman Animals: A Non-Speciesist Understanding of Gendered Reproductive Violence. Palgrave Macmillan.
    • Banwell, S. Black, L., Cecil, D.K., Djamba, Y.K., Kimuna, S.R., Milne, E., Seal, L., Tenkorang, E.Y (eds). (2023). The Emerald International Handbook of Feminist Perspectives on Women’s Acts of Violence. Emerald Publishing Limited.
    • Fanghanel, A., Milne, E., Zampini, G.F., Banwell, S. and Fiddler, M. (2021) Sex and Crime. London: SAGE.
    • Banwell, S. (2020). 'Gender and the Violence(s) of War and Armed Conflict: More dangerous to be a woman?' Emerald Publishing Limited.
    • Banwell, S. (2019). Gender, North–South relations: Reviewing the Global Gag Rule and the defunding of UNFPA under President Trump. Third World Quarterly. 41(1):1-19.
    • Banwell, S. (2018). Security, Peace and Development: Unpacking Discursive Constructions of Wartime Rape and Sexual Violence in Syria. International Journal of Peace and Development Studies. 9(2):15-30
    • Fiddler, M. and Banwell, S. (2018). "Forget about all your taboos": Transgressive Memory and Nazisploitation. Studies in European Cinema. 16(2):141-154.
    • Banwell, S. and Fiddler, M. (2017). Gendered Viewing Strategies: A Critique of Holocaust-related Films that Eroticize, Monsterize and Fetishize the Female Body. Holocaust Studies: A Journal of Culture and History. 24(2):150-171.
    • Banwell, S. (2016). Rassenschande, Genocide and the Reproductive Jewish Body: Examining the use of Rape and Sexualized Violence Against Jewish Women during the Holocaust. Journal of Modern Jewish Studies. 15(2):208-227.
    • Banwell, S. (2015). Globalization masculinities, empire-building and forced prostitution: A critical analysis of the gendered impact of the neoliberal economic agenda in post-invasion/occupation Iraq. Third World Quarterly. 36(4):705-722.
    • Banwell, S. (2014). Rape and sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo: A case study of gender-based violence. Journal of Gender Studies. 23(1):45-58.
    • Banwell, S. (2011). Women, Violence and Gray Zones: Resolving the Paradox of the Female Victim-Perpetrator. [Online] The Internet Journal of Criminology.
    • Banwell, S. (2010) Gendered narratives: Women's subjective accounts of their use of violence and alternative aggression(s) within their marital relationships. Feminist Criminology. 5(2): 116–34.

Presentations

    • Banwell, S. and Nelson, V. (2023, December). Listing ecocide as an atrocity crime: what, if any, are the benefits for reducing deforestation for animal agriculture?’ Greening Justice conference. [Paper Presentation]. Online Liverpool Hope University.
    • Banwell, S. (2023, September). Slow violence and the animal-industrial complex: Unpacking the consequences of coercive confinement during the war against nonhuman animals. [Paper Presentation]. European Society of Criminology Florence, Italy.
    • Forsythe, L, Lopez, D and Banwell, S. (2023, June). Gender-based violence and the Anthropocene: territories of risk and mobilization. DSA 2023 conference: Crisis in the Anthropocene: rethinking connection and agency for development.  [Panel convenor]. Reading, UK.
    • Banwell, S. (2023, May). ‘Land of the Fur’: Using complex systems science to unpack the relationship between climate change, racialized, gendered and ethnopolitical violence during the genocide in Darfur. [Paper Presentation].  The Asian Conference on the Social Sciences, Tokyo, Japan.
    • Banwell, S. (2022, November). Nonspeciesist Criminology and the War Against Nonhuman Animals. [Paper Presentation].  American Society of Criminology conference, Atlanta, USA.
    • Banwell, S. (2022, September). Green criminology, biopolitical violence and the war against nonhuman animals. [Paper Presentation]. European Society of Criminology in Malaga, Spain.
    • Banwell, S. (2021, July.). Which bodies matter? A review of sexual, coerced and reproductive violence committed against nonhuman animals. [Paper Presentation].  British Society of Criminology conference. Online.
    • Banwell, S. (2020, September). ‘Children of the enemy’: Exploring the unresolved trauma of genocidal rape. [Paper Presentation] European Society of Criminology e-conference.
    • Banwell, S. (2020).  “I am a cancer”: Unpacking the Lived Experiences of Children born from Genocidal Rape. Abstract accepted for the thematic session submission Ghost Criminology at the annual American Society of Criminology Conference, Washington DC (this meeting was cancelled due to COVID-19).
    • Banwell, S. (2019, November). Forced Pregnancy versus forcible impregnation: A critical analysis of genocidal rape during war/armed conflict. [Paper Presentation]. American Society of Criminology Conference. San Francisco, USA.
    • Banwell, S. (2019, May). “When she decides… the world is better, stronger, safer.” Reviewing the impact of president trump’s revised gag order on females’ access to safe abortion in crisis, emergency and humanitarian settings.  [Paper Presentation]. NORA Conference on Border Regimes, Territorial Discourses, and Feminist Politics. Reykjavik, Iceland.
    • Banwell, S. (2018, December). The ‘Feminine-as-Monstrous’: Using the whore narrative to unpack representations of militarised femininity gone awry.  [Paper Presentation].  Progressive Connexions Evil Women: Women and Evil interdisciplinary Conference, Vienna, Austria.
    • Banwell, S. (2018, August). “Wars are being fought on the bodies of women and children”: Unpacking gender and the human security framework.  [Paper Presentation].  European Society of Criminology Conference, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
    • Banwell, S. (2018, June). Gender-based violence against women and girls within and beyond the Syrian conflict zone. [Paper Presentation].  The Annual Conference of the European Network on Gender and Violence, Bristol, UK.
    • Banwell, S. (2017, November). “This is beyond something we've seen before:” Unpacking orientalist and ethnocentric interpretations of wartime rape. [Paper Presentation].  American Society of Criminology Conference. Philadelphia, USA.
    • Banwell, S. and Fiddler, M. (2016, November). “You will love in love camp 7”: Genocidal violence, verisimilitude and the poetics of space. [Paper Presentation].  American Society of Criminology Conference. New Orleans, USA.
    • Banwell, S. (2015, June). The law as violence against women: Sex workers' views on stigma, exclusion, governance and patriarchy. [Paper Presentation].  Cultural Criminology Conference. Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
    • Banwell, S. (2014, November). Woman-as-Nation: Reassessing wartime rape and the reproductive body. [Paper Presentation]. American Society of Criminology Conference. San Francisco, USA.
    • Banwell S. (2014, July). "Decriminalization helps all of us and criminalization harms all of us": The subjective viewpoints of sex workers on the current proposals to reform prostitution laws in the UK. [Paper Presentation]. British Society of Criminology Conference, Liverpool, UK.
    • Banwell, S. and Clift, S. (2013, September). Dangerous sex? sexuality, risk and the criminal justice system.  [Paper Presentation]. European Society of Criminology Conference. Budapest, Hungary.
    • Banwell, S. (2011, November). Women, rape and warfare: A gendered critique of just war theory and the immunity principle. [Paper Presentation]. The Gendered Violence Conference. Bristol, UK.
    • Banwell, S. (2010, July). Karla Homolka: Victim or agent? women, violence and gray zones.  [Paper Presentation]. British Society of Criminology Conference. Leicester, UK.
    • Banwell, S. (2007, September). Gendered narratives: Women's subjective accounts of their use of indirect/alternative aggressions and violence within their marital relationships.  [Paper Presentation].  International Conference - What Works with Women Offenders: Challenging Stereotypes and Achieving Change. Prato, Italy.
    • Banwell, S. (2006, July). Delinquent girls? Rethinking female violence. [Paper Presentation]. British Society of Criminology Conference. Glasgow, UK.