Questioning Crime and Criminology

This is a text for criminology students designed to take them to the heart of the contradictions, confusions and blurred boundaries around the subject of crimeabout what crime is, about social regulation and control, and about social responsibility. It focuses on the key questions and issues underpinning them in contemporary definitions, representations and explanations of crime. It questions the platitudes and clichs surrounding public discussion of crime, by acknowledging the individual, social and political frameworks within which we explore crime and criminality. Questioning Crime and Criminology explores the nature of criminology as a discipline. It assumes that for students to understand crime and criminology they need to understand the wider societal and sociological implications of all crime related phenomena, and not just explore individual, psychological meanings.

Introduction: crime is exciting but what of criminology? Moira Peelo and Keith Soothill 1. Capturing criminology, Keith Soothill 2. Crime and the media: public narratives and private consumption, Moira Peelo 3. Racing to conclusions: thinking sociologically about police race relations, Simon Holdaway 4. Inequality and crime, Chris Grover 5. Burning issues: fire, carnival and crime, Mike Presdee 6. Drugs and society, Fiona Measham 7. Explaining changing patterns of crime, Brian Francis and Keith Soothill 8. Everyday surveillance: personal data and social classifications, David Lyon Conclusions, Moira Peelo and Keith Soothill

Peelo, Moira; Soothill, Keith