Introduction to Criminology

Introduction to criminology as a science, including the study of crime, criminals, and society’s response to them.

Description:

This course is designed to introduce students to the field of criminology.  In this course, we will look at what constitutes criminal behavior, criminal law, and our system of criminal justice.  We will cover the terminology used by criminologists to characterize various types of crimes and victimization as well as the organizations developed to control and study crime.  Discussions will focus on both classic and contemporary theories as well as the research methods social scientists (primarily criminologists and sociologists, but also psychologists, economists, and political scientists) use to help us to better understand crime in America as well as in other societies and cultures. 

Students will be challenged to go beyond glib explanations, avoiding such terms as “bad” and “mean” to understand the complex pathways of influences on human behavior that lead to criminal thoughts, urges, and behavior.  Just as social context shapes general beliefs, however, it also shapes beliefs about crime; we will consider how different explanations have emerged at different times and understand how social context contributes to explanations of crime.  To develop credible explanations for crime we must understand the nature of crime, and we will examine a range of criminal activity.

Objectives:

  • Construct a criminological definition of crime and outline the historical precedents of modern criminology. 
  • Understand the role of criminological research, data gathering, and analysis, and the basic research methodologies used by criminologists. 
  • Evaluate the nature of a variety of criminal activities and distinguish between and compare the characteristics of various crime typologies. 
  • Assess the measurement of various types of crime and trace its extent historically. 
  • Distinguish between and apply various individual criminological theories within each criminological perspective. 
  • Evaluate how social context impacts thought concerning crime and its causes.   
  • Critique responses to crime and criminal activity within US society. 
  • Understand professional applications of disciplinary concepts.