The culture of fear and changing daily life practices based on the stories of women victims of crime: The case of Amasya- Merzifon

The fact that today's societies have a rapidly changing and developing structure has brought with it the phenomenon that the emotional states of its members change over time. The complexity of life, the diversity of the dimensions of daily life and like all other elements, the increase of the means and possibilities of crime have been a phenomenon that has shaped the lives of individuals and groups. It is observed that the crime phenomenon increasing day by day in the postmodern period causes the feeling of "fear" to be dominant, which directly or indirectly affects the daily lives of individuals. Over time, this dominant feeling has revealed the "culture of fear" by becoming widespread and patterned. The culture of fear is the state of being in a feeling of fear and anxiety that threatens every aspect of daily life from the behavior patterns of individuals to their lifestyles. In Turkey, the rate of women's exposure to various crimes, especially femicide, has increased significantly in recent years. Because women are social and sensitive beings, even if they are not exposed to crime in their daily lives the cases of witnessing someone being exposed to crime in their interaction environment develop a fear of being a victim of crime; therefore, their daily routines are shaped by this fear, as well as other factors. In this context, this thesis study aims to reveal the conditions in which the interaction environment of women who are exposed to crime (murder victim women) gets into fear of crime and to what extent this fear affects their daily life practices. Different from the previous studies, this research has a unique value in that it goes beyond the victimization of the individual who has been exposed to crime and reveals the indirect experience of the crime victim's interaction environment. In addition, the fact that current study discusses the cases of exposure to crime in terms of the fear culture and shaping daily life distinguishes it from its counterparts. This thesis study will be carried out by adhering to the qualitative research method, using phenomenological design, in-depth interview based on semi-structured interview technique, and criterion sampling which is one of the purposive sampling methods. This thesis will be handled primarily within the district borders of Amasya- Merzifon, and then in other provinces in the cases that meet the criteria. With the findings to be evaluated together with the relevant theoretical data it is aimed to contribute to the literature by focusing on the interaction environment of the individual and the fear culture based on the indirect experience that is effective there, which was determined to be deficient in the previous studies that generally focused on the individual exposed to crime in the context of victimization studies.