ABSTRACT
Kushner challenges and contradicts the widespread claim that there is a difference in the suicidal behavior of the two sexes. His analysis focuses on the meanings different people attach to suicide—those of the individual woman or man who attempts or commits suicide, those of the people who interpret the suicide's behavior, and those that are available in the larger culture. Thus Kushner's reanalysis illustrates the hermeneutic dimension in this body of research at several different levels: What appears at first glance to be an objective phenomena—one either does or does not attempt to commit suicide—is, after all, a matter of interpretation; and what appears to be a sex difference in the suicide rates of the genders reflects not only differences in interpretation but also sex-related differences in methods available for ending one's own life.
