BA (Hons) Criminology

The module considers the growth and development of criminological theories and methodologies in the context of the forms of representation, policing, constraint and government of people and things and largely in the contexts of the city and the nation over the course of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The module is divided into four parts across twenty weeks.

a) It initially considers the social pathology of the gang within the milieu of the urban. This provides an opportunity to reflect on some of the early Chicago School ethnographies and analyses of the urban (Cressey, Park and Burgess, Thrasher), questions about culture and environment, and also importantly adolescence and delinquency. This work is then contrasted with contemporary analyses of the gang (Venkatesh, Alexander, Hagedorn) in order to notice the striking continuities, but also the discontinuities with regard to understandings of gender, race and ethnicity, culture and the global.

b) Secondly, the module considers the work of Becker, Cohen, Hall. Walkowitz and others regarding the labelling and representation of crime and the work of representation in the criminalisation of populations and areas of the city.

c) Thirdly, the module looks at the role of disciplining, punishing and confining institutions and technologies through the writing of Goffman, Foucault, Wacquant, Davis, Khalili and Graham. What kind of institution is the prison? How has it developed in the form it has? What is its role now? And how has its inventiveness spilled out into wider social environments and contexts?

d) Finally, the module considers the circulation and associations of people and things in the context of technologies of security and territory. Through a consideration of cases such as the global sex trade, the circulation of images of child sexual abuse, the control of drugs, and the war on terror, the module focuses on the fundamental question of movement and security.

The module takes its lead from Jock Young’s call to the criminological imagination and his critique of a criminology based on a realist, positivist and often quantitative conception of evidence. It is a direction that brings to the fore an understanding of what is referred to as ‘cultural criminology’, one which seeks to make sense of the lived cultures and phenomenological experiences of crime.

But the module understands this call more broadly in terms of how crime and the criminological are refracted through a rich and diverse field of media and cultural forms, devices and practices. It considers the imagination of crime and criminality from nineteenth century novelistic descriptions of the city and poverty, to photography and phrenology in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, to press representations of sex crime in the 1970s, to forensic analysis in television police series, to online portrayals of banking fraud.

Examples and case studies provide depth and empirical focus throughout the module. It also provides a theoretical and methodological framework for understanding what the criminological imagination might mean and how we might bring to the fore its critical analytical force.

This module aims to introduce you to the ‘sociological imagination’. What is distinctive about sociology? With a focus on knowledge and power, this module looks at how sociology has developed, with an emphasis on the study of relations between individuals and groups in modern industrial societies.

This module introduces you to the methods that social scientists have developed to analyse societies and to produce social scientific knowledge. Through lectures and workshops you learn about methods in relation to various topics and research traditions.

Exploring the sub-discipline of historical sociology, the module focuses on the formation of the modern state out of earlier types of political organisation, and different ways of understanding state power. It examines processes such as: revolution; the development of nationalism; the nature of imperialism; post-socialism; and the rise of fascism.

Cultural criminology ‘captures the phenomenology of crime – its adrenaline, its pleasure and panic, its excitement and its anger, rage and humiliation, its desperation and its edgework’ (Jock Young, 2011: 84).

We take this as our starting point for an investigation of the subjectivity of crime and its material contexts. This module investigates what factors impact on our sense (seeing, touching, hearing, smelling) and imagination of crime, particularly in the context of material conditions, technological devices, and built environments. It considers a range of issues from street lighting, to mosquito sonic transmitters as a deterrent for young 'hooligans' to the idea of 'bobbies on the beat' to the role of video analysis in 'police brutality' (e.g. in the Rodney King trial).

The module is structured through a series of case studies that provide the basis for critical reflection on how we imagine and feel crime and the threat of crime. The intention is to understand how we experience crime inasmuch as that experience is mediated. In a sense, this is a methodological question. For example, if video analysis is central to the legal judgement of the killing of a young black man in the United States of America, how do we see the criminal act in a court of law? If we feel unsafe in a poorly lit street, what factors contribute to our feeling insecure? If we have been personally injured, does that mean the punishment should match how we feel about our injury?

This module – which has Researching Society and Culture 1 as a prerequisite- looks in detail at the various stages in the research process: including the construction of research questions, collecting and analysing data and the political and ethical questions involved in thinking about writing for an audience. You're encouraged to work through these issues by reading particular research monographs and by developing your own research proposal.

The module considers a number of issues broadly concerning crime: both criminal acts themselves and the legal, penal, civil society and policing frameworks which address and frame them. The module explores longstanding philosophical and social theoretical questions about the relationship between crime, the law, justice and rights. It is specifically concerned with the actualisation of ideas, theory, principles and discourse into practice and lived experience.

The module is structured around guest speakers who will talk about their experiences and research concerning how things actually happen, in relation to theories and ideas about how things are said to happen.

The module explores the space between law’s conceptualisation of itself as being neutral, above and outside society, and a social critique of that conceptualisation which focuses on all the ways in which law falls short of its own ideals. Law is understood as a relationship between concepts and their actualisations by social actors; a relationship between the conceptual and the material.

The module also considers the institutions of criminal justice systems (for example, police, judiciary, legal defence and prosecution, legal support, sentencing, prison).

This module considers crimes against humanity. In terms of social theory, it asks what it might mean to say that something is a crime against humanity as a whole, or against the human condition, rather than simply a crime against a particular state or a particular national law. You will consider the meaning of key concepts such as humanity, state, universal jurisdiction, and individual responsibility.

The introduction to this module will also look at sociological theories of nationalism and the distinction between civic and ethnic nationalism. It will go on to consider totalitarianism, comparing Bauman's analysis of totalitarianism as a prototype of 'modernity' with Arendt's understanding of totalitarianism as a revolt against modern forms.

You will study what kinds of behaviour constitute crimes against humanity; how, why and by whom such crimes are committed, and consider what kinds of international legal instruments and institutions have arisen to designate crimes against humanity as such and to try to prevent or punish them. The module will also explore the difficulties of cultural representation of crimes against humanity, through movies including Shoah, Schindler's List, Ararat, Hotel Rwanda and The Act of Killing.

Throughout this module, you will develop a materialist sociological methodology: using concepts to understand case studies and case studies to shed light on concepts.

The module will cover contemporary approaches to the body and especially sexuality, beginning with an introduction to Foucaultian critiques and associated theories of performativity. It will provoke a series of questions about social constructionism and materiality, inviting students to evaluate more process oriented theories of performativity as well as those emphasising the productive work of speech acts (Butler). The terms ‘drugs’ and ‘technology’ in the title give emphasis to the way in which the body will be posed as always already engaged with phenomena that is more commonly deemed external. This conceptual approach will introduce students in second year to more contemporary debates and particularly debates that offer a more applied approach to inquiries of the body in relation to health, medicine and everyday technologies.

‘Leisure is free time’. But is it? We need only think about the annual subscription to gymnasiums to recognise that leisure-time really isn’t ‘free-time’. ‘Leisure is a marker for time away from work’. But we need only think of the time of the harried vacation to know that the clock-time of work never ceases to operate. In critical theory, leisure-time is defined as functionally dependent on the labour market system. Indeed leisure is revealed as big business, as leisure-time becomes ever more central to consumer culture. This module examines the interconnections between leisure, culture and society. 

How is space stabalised and de-stabalised? How do we imagine space? How is space invented? These questions will be considered from within different contexts, where space is understood to be invaded. The arrival of outsiders (on the grounds of not being human or the right kind of human) in places not demarcated for them will form the basis of several case studies on this module.

The production, representation and performance of space will be central. Both theoretical readings and sociological fieldwork will form the basis of the learning. Students will consider a series of case studies from public and private domains. These will include cities, public spaces, political sites, national ceremonies and animals in the civic space.

The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu once noted that ‘sociology and art make an odd couple’: indeed whilst sociological investigations on the arts and aesthetics can be traced back to the founders of the discipline, they remain, like their subject matter, a diverse and changing field.

Still, in recent years the sociology of art has been emerging from its marginality, increasingly combining theoretical investigations with empirical research on contemporary artistic phenomena. This module will introduce key themes and authors in the sociology of art, classical and contemporary.

It will outline both a history of theoretical approaches and an overview of major results and trends in empirical research; key case studies will illustrate and interrogate the thematic core of each lecture. The lectures are divided in two parts, enshrined in a thematic approach that highlights crucial issues, such as: is art about beauty? What is an artist? Is art beyond society? Should art be political?

Organisations make strange things happen. Organisations can cause serious problems. Some organisations can be quite useful or may even be necessary for doing things well together. Schools, churches, banks, supermarkets, the state and indeed the university not only shape the world but also shape the way we see the world and the way we see ourselves. This module explores the role of organisations in social life through a range of theoretical approaches and case studies.

The module draws on work from cultural studies and sociology to think critically about the relationships between forms of cultural representation and the construction of modern self-identity. The module will examine different approaches to representation such as those developed in the work of Ferdinand de Saussure, Roland Barthes and Stuart Hall. We will also discuss more recent theoretical approaches to difference based upon recognition of generosity and cosmopolitanism. Across the module, examples will be taken from areas such as advertising, photography, tattooing and other cultural forms. 

This is a visually oriented urban sociology module in which students are taught close observation of urban space in broader context and required to work through a combination of photography and writing. This module introduces students to key themes in sociology – class, ethnicity, space, time, social inequalities, social change - through active engagement with the urban environment around New Cross specifically and more generally other areas of London. It combines classroom lectures with lectures, observation, workshops and other activities embedded in urban walks. 

This module will introduce students to basic concepts developed from Marxist theory that are now ubiquitous elsewhere such as class, value, alienation, exploitation, and fetishism. Each week will focus on a basic concept; start with its original source, explain, contextualise, and trace its development and critique as it progresses through social theory and sometimes into popular uses. Each concept will be interrogated then developed in relation to contemporary issues, exploring its significance and explanatory power as a critical sociological tool.

This module explores a selection of approaches to the sociological study of the body, as well as substantive problem-areas where the body has become an important focus of research. You address the contrast between traditions that approach the body as an object (the body we have), those that approach the body as a subject (the body we are), and those that address the body in terms of performativity (the body we become). 

The first part of the module is primarily concerned with establishing a firm grasp of the fundamental approaches to the political sociology of democratic societies, whist the second introduces debates – over planning, ethnic cleansing, neoliberal ‘de-democratisation’ – that will allow us to think through the relevance of the classical categories of political sociology to the study of contemporary societies. 

Global issues of crime and crime control are of double importance in criminology. Firstly, they demand sophisticated new methods for their comprehension; and secondly they demand that we revisit the theories we have previously used.

Criminologists now recognize that many of our theories, developed during colonialism and empire, are not relevant outside of the global north, and may even be harmful. As a result, contemporary criminologists need to learn to think globally in comprehending and researching transnational and global forms of crime.

This module has a theoretical core that draws on post-colonial theory, and critical theory of globalisation. Substantively, it examines a wide variety of forms of transnational and global crime including organised crime, drug trafficking and human trafficking, the so-called war on drugs and border control.

With migration frequently presented as a situation of ‘crisis’, this module considers broader contexts and longer histories of migration to and within Europe, and will consider the academic field migration as an inter-disciplinary field of study.

Exploring contemporary literature from writers and theorists working in a European context, the module will present students with starting points from which to consider migration using core sociological concepts, particularly of place, ‘race’ and power.

The module will follow a migration pathway, with focus points considered through lenses of leaving, moving, arriving and staying:

• Leaving - We will examine those legal frameworks and international agreements relevant to migration, and will explore the uneasy distinction between so-called forced migration and economic migration.
• Moving - We will consider borders and immigration controls, border theories, and the differentiated legal statutes of migrating people as linked to colonial and postcolonial relationships.
• Arriving - We will reflect on notions of displacement, exile, integration strategies and policies, representations of migrants and racism, and examples of activism with and by migrants. Staying – We will look at migration and cities, and focus on experiences of young migrants in particular.

tbc

The central question in this module is: ‘what is to be done about crime?’

This module engages with contemporary developments in criminology and criminal justice, for example, the use of forensic science in crime detection, the impact of austerity and privatization on criminal justice agencies and the introduction of novel alternatives such as restorative justice.

This module also engages with theoretical debates about the nature of justice, punishment and rehabilitation. Reflecting the sociological approach central to the degree, this module pays close attention to social inequalities, such as gender, class, ethnicity etc.

This is an advanced level module that builds on modules such as Policing the State, Criminological Imaginations I and II and Criminal Justice in Context by engaging with key theoretical debates in criminology.

All students undertake a dissertation in their final year reflecting their academic and personal interests. This is a piece of independent research, supported by classes and subject specialists, resulting in an 8,000-word dissertation on a criminological topic of your choice.

Students have undertaken dissertations on wide-ranging topics such as graffiti writing, the experiences of undocumented migrants and media coverage of death in police custody.

This examines some of the conceptual and political problems that have clustered around sociological analysis of ‘race’ and racism. It is comparative in focus and encompasses both historical and theoretical material. It introduces some of the major sociological paradigms of ‘race relations’ analysis and relates them to a variety of examples. 

Globalisations is both a dominant discourse of powerful actors on the world scene, as well as the main target for one of the most vibrant new social movements. This module aims to develop a critical and historical understanding of the issues which inform contemporary debates on globalisation. 

This module is about the relationships between vision, sensuality and the production of truth, knowledge, and identity in Euro-American cultures. It asks: how do historically and culturally specific ways of seeing and sensing shape ways of knowing (epistemology) and ways of being (ontology)? What are the relationships between vision, sensuality and power?

What are the epistemological, methodological and ethical demands that are made upon sociology in its encounters with the visual and the sensual? Through discussion of topics such as Deigo Velázquez' 1656 painting Las Meninas, the camera and photography, and the visual manipulation of identity through ‘passing’, the module will provide a forum for thinking about the pleasures, dangers and contingencies present in visualising the social world. 

This approaches childhood as a socio-historically constructed concept, with material, technological and political dimensions and consequences. Through a mixture of theoretical readings and issue-based discussions, you explore the regulated constitution of childhood and its changing parameters. Some of the substantive areas explored include: changing household patterns from the child’s perspective, child sexual abuse, infancy and foetal life, children’s literature. 

The module approaches learning about social research through data analysis. Data analysis is used as an exploratory device a means to generate questions about topics such as class, gender and race and then attempt to suggest possible answers supported by evidence. The module is made possible by the existence of vast archives of sociological data that can be accessed from the ESRC survey resource network including the qualidata archive.

Conventional ways of demarcating economic, power, and cultural relationships have long relied up notions of "North and South", "first and third", "east and west", "colonial and post-colonial." These means of envisioning the world and of tracing the intersections among diverse places, times, and peoples, while maintaining some salience, no longer seem to grasp what is really taking place.

The module, in particular, explores the emerging relationships between Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East and Africa—articulations that have been elaborated over a long history but which now take shape in new and powerful ways.

Additionally, there are a plurality of "worlds” that enjoin different actors and spaces that cannot be easily defined according to geopolitical understandings--where information infrastructure, design, telecommunications, and travel combine to create new possibilities of transaction. The module looks at how these worlds affect our understandings of sociality, actors, and collective life, in general, and the shape and operations of emerging powers in particular.

This module will engage with issues of privacy, surveillance and security. Recent years have seen a huge growth in demands for: certainty in the verification of identity; accountability of individual and organisational activity; and mechanisms designed to accumulate knowledge of what individuals and groups may do in the near future. First, the module will provide a background to the historical development of surveillance and the mobilizing of notions of security through specific political regimes.

Second, the module will investigate contemporary issues in privacy, surveillance and security including: the rise of CCTV and the visualization of order, airports and spaces of disciplined consumption, the management of everyday life and claims regarding the death of privacy. Third, the module will end by investigating the possibility of addressing tensions between privacy, surveillance and security issues.

In particular we will focus on technologies as solutions, market based mechanisms and the valuation of privacy, and the variety of interventions, engagements and accountabilities with regard to surveillance that have been developed in recent years.

This module engages students in close readings of a small number of contemporary philosophers and thinkers who provoke us to consider questions of politics and alterity (or ‘difference’) anew. It aims to give students a sense of the constitution of politics as a relational and agonistic complex of power relations. We will consider how the chosen thinkers have attempted to define power and ‘the political’ and how they help us theorise political dynamics. Our texts will give us the opportunity to reflect on contemporary political situations and events.

What is subjectivity? The module will explore ‘subjectivity’ by engaging with questions around health, disease, illness and medicine; through this thematic focus you will develop an understanding of one of the most important concepts in social theory more generally. ‘Subjectivity’ implies a reference to the subject/object dichotomy that has traditionally been mapped onto the distinctions between ‘mind’ and ‘body’, ‘meaning’ and ‘cause’, ‘value’ and ‘fact’

As incarceration rates reach record levels around the world, the use of penal power and its impact upon those subject to it are urgent areas of social inquiry. Taking perspectives from sociology and criminology, this module will introduce key debates about what prison is for, what it does, and what alternatives may be possible. We will ask how practices of imprisonment have been intertwined with other aspects of state power in historical and contemporary contexts.

Focusing primarily on Britain and the United States, we will pay particular attention to the interaction of penal policies with structures of racism, gender, class, nation and disability, examining the prison as a ‘concrete space where global inequalities play out’ (Bosworth and Kaufman 2013, 171).

We will engage with classic and contemporary research to think about the lived experiences of prisoners on the inside, as well as how regimes of imprisonment shape the social terrain and broader discourses of identity, citizenship and social order on the outside.