Crime, Law, and Deviance

Principles of criminology and contemporary theories of criminal behavior, focusing on the extent and distribution of crime in the United States.

Focuses on women as victims and perpetrators of crime, with particular attention to race and class. Analyzes how social, cultural, and economic factors influence victimization and participation in crime. Includes adolescent girls involvement with crime, including juvenile gangs. Evaluates theoretical explanations of why women commit crime. Examines womens experiences with the criminal justice system.

An in-depth exploration of the multifaceted field of victimology. A scientific study of victims and the aftermath of victimization, which delves into the physical, emotional, and psychological consequences victims endure. Provides insights into the historical context of victim studies, various theoretical frameworks, and the evolving role of the criminal justice system concerning victims' rights and advocacy. Additionally, this course examines the societal consequences of victimization and explores preventive, interventionist, and compensatory mechanisms to support victims and mitigate the impact of crimes.

Examination of juvenile delinquency. Includes methods of data collection and the extent and distribution of delinquency. Detailed coverage of theories of delinquent behavior. Examines the juvenile justice system and treatment and prevention of delinquency. Utilizes current empirical research on delinquency in the U.S. and internationally.

Empirical patterns and consequences of cybercrimes. Emphasis on applying criminological theories of crime and victimization to cyberspace. Cybercrime prevention strategies and tactics. Examination of ethical issues of privacy, security, and social control.

Focuses on the causes, manifestations, and consequences of hate crimes in the United States. Includes theories of prejudice and biased behavior, the context of perpetration, the individual and community-level effects on the victims, and the political, historical, and social significance of such crimes. Considers broad questions of bias compared to hate, the recognition and prosecution of hate crimes compared to non-bias crimes, the impacts of hate crimes at the individual and community levels, and responses by law enforcement and communities.

Focuses on the ways in which involvement in the criminal justice system affects families and family systems. Analyzes the antecedents and consequences of parental incarceration, including an investigation as to how social policies influence this phenomenon. Includes how offenders and their families are embedded in the criminal justice system and learn to navigate periods of incarceration and reentry—which includes family members’ secondary prisonization. Examines the emotional and financial costs of incarceration and reentry on families, as families serve as informal safety nets.

Examines behaviors considered deviant in the United States. Explores major types of deviant behavior, such as corporate crimes, extremist groups, sexual deviance, violence, suicide, alcoholism and other drug addictions, and cyber deviance. Includes sociological theories that explain them.

The functions of law as a form of social control. The social forces in the creation, enforcement, and change of the law. The nature of law as a force in social change. Taught alternate years.

Examines the use of drugs, including legal and illegal drugs, from a sociological perspective. Cross-cultural and historical patterns of use are discussed and explained. Particular attention is given to drug use within the context of various social institutions.

Focuses on the nature, extent, causes, and consequences of widely recognized forms of violence within schools, such as bullying, fighting, sexual assaults, harassment, dating violence, and shootings. Examines the effectiveness of violence prevention programs. Includes sociological theories of violence within schools. Explores the social debate over balancing the collective public safety obligations of schools with individual students rights/responsibilities.

Introduces major theories of peace and violence. Explores contemporary patterns and root causes of interpersonal, institutional, and structural violence. Particular attention to conflict management, prevention, strategies, and promotion of peace at the local, national, and global levels.

Introduces fundamental principles, values and skills of conflict resolution. Special emphasis on facilitative mediation, restorative justice and other conflict resolution methodologies in the greater context of peacebuilding. Exploration of conflict resolution as tools of personal development and social justice.

Examines major theories in the interdisciplinary field of peace studies. Includes current, historical, and global causes, patterns and types of conflict, and methods of conflict resolution. Particular attention given to the philosophical and sociological discussions of the causes of violence and the possibilities for peace.