Dr. Dahmer And Dennis Nilsen - 4366 Words

After developing a fascination for the mindset of criminals at an early age, two cases that I personally found most gripping were those of the infamous Jeffrey Dahmer and Dennis Nilsen. Like most people in the UK, I too am familiar with the crimes of Nilsen, the Scottish serial killer well known for forming sexual relationships with his victims. Albeit the second serial killer is less well known in Britain, Jeffrey Dahmer is a household name in USA and became particularly famous for cannibalising and sodomising his latter victims. My project will attempt to draw on both differences and similarities between the primary motivations of the pair. Despite the duo never meeting, nor experiencing first hand company of each other, their motives and causes of certain anomalous human behaviour were very similar. By using the symbolic interactionist approach regarding the creation of the killers’ reality and their ‘self’ I will be exhibiting academic and practical applications of the paradigm’s theoretical approach (a theoretical approach that tends to rely on dialogic methods; methods combining observation and interviewing with approaches that foster conversation and reflection) to try and explain the causes behind why such heinous crimes took place and to answer the question as to whether Dahmer, Nilsen, or both, were in fact killing for company. Jeffrey Dahmer and Dennis Nilsen were both ordinary men who became quiet killers, merging their sexual excitement over corpses with an