Of Men And Monsters Sparknotes

Of Men and Monsters explores the serial killer as an American cultural icon, one that both attracts and repels. In this book there are many different themes some include criminology and sociology. The book also explains Jeffrey Dahmer’s life from start to end. It also explains some stereotypes of serial killers and what other important books and authors have to say about the concepts. Tithecott also talk about what a serial killer is and what make them considered a serial killer. He also talks about how and why a person becomes a serial killer. He also talks a little bit about an author by the name of Jenkins and how he agrees with some of his ideas and sayings and how he disagrees with them.
Richard Tithecott's Of Men and Monsters provides a great preview into

the public's interest with serial killers. While primarily focusing on Jeffrey Dahmer as his prime example Richard Tithecott follows the process in which several different topics--medical, legal, sociological, criminological, and historical—contribute towards a more descriptive understanding of the serial killer which elevates him to higher status.

Throughout all stages of the Dahmer case, we witness this detailed process of social constructions that include his childhood, his murders, his arrest by the police, the uncovering of gruesome evidence in his apartment, the public trial, there is also a question floating around about his clutch on sanity, his sentencing and his time in jail, and, finally, Dahmer's violent death in prison. In tracing the development of the case, Tithecott outlines the social roles that the serial killer can be made to play; he can appear as animal, kind person, royalty, crazed homosexual, outgoing loner, or a deadly infection of the social body. Tithecott's basis throughout analysis is that "serial killing should not be explained away as 'something else,' but that the serial killer is 'doing what he wants to do,' making his fantasies come tragically true" (p. 59). The book's two major topics, one entitled "Policing the Serial Killer," the other "Dreaming the Serial Killer". "Dreaming the Serial Killer," suggests that these fantasies the killer lives out are shared by his family and the environment around him. Also visions of crooked views the killers need

to control and suppress, but also visions of coming together and equal opportunities we need to recognize as parts of their personal and cultural selves. Tithecott suggests serial killing, is a cultural construct that enforces social boundaries. "An argument that goes against the mind of the killer is a monstrous thing, a force so odd to us that we never need to face the possibility that violence--committed by any type of killer is part and piece of our culture we live today.”Figured as almost extraterrestrial, beyond the reach of normal man," Tithecott writes, the serial killer "exists in a world of unspeakable ness, an immaterial world beyond the (female) body of language and the text" (p. 161).
Though work by Jane Caputi, Cameron and Frazier, and Joel Black has paved the way for a critical document of serial murders, Tithecott's book is very deeply kind to Philip Jenkins' book Using Murder: The Social Construction of Serial Homicide (1994). Jenkins argues that serial killers hardly ever rise up to their popular stereotype. The social construction of serial murder is consistently at par with criminological and sociological research because it is controlled by law enforcement and special interest groups, which all pursue their own respective sires of ideas but hold the same main topics. Against the stereotype of the white male who has suffered from abuse during his childhood, Jenkins poses a more highly altered and different image, which acknowledges that serial murder is committed by a wide variety of culprits.
While Tithecott researches on the same stride of taking apart the stereotype and debunking the serial killer as a figure of myth, he clearly goes beyond Jenkins when he agrees that the "myth of the serial killer is maintained with the help of fantasies that we ascribe to the serial killer being inextricably implicated in and interpenetrated by the dreams of 'normal' society" (p. 178). This dramatic bend in Tithecott's argument, which is quite unlike Jenkins' concentration of sociology and criminology, makes Of Men and Monsters a welcome addition to the increasing number of critical studies of serial murder, perhaps even more so because Tithecott manages to discuss the more complex theoretical aspects of his topic in a straightforward, easy to understand book. Where Jenkins sees the FBI as the primary "author" of the talk on serial murder, Tithecott goes into the flow of postmodern culture, abandoning the notion of a single, accountable author and instead indicting us to read for our connection in the myth. Where Jenkins makes a practical point suggesting for improving law enforcement techniques, Tithecott acknowledges our tendency to naturalize power in order to overcome social difference and injustice. As well as its sophisticated reading of popular culture, Of Men and Monsters ultimately aims at empowering its readers to learn more about serial killing and how it is dealt with. Of Men and Monsters has not won any awards but it still is a very good book.
I would highly suggest reading this book if you have any interest in serial killing, FBI investigations, Criminology, Sociology or Jeffrey Dahmer. Overall I think this book was an interesting, good read and I was glad I picked it. Also if you end up reading this book and like it there are also many other books on serial killing and other types of forensic science.