SOC 6628 - Gender, Crime, and Justice

3 Semester Hour(s)

This course is designed to explore the important and understudied intersection between gender/women and crime. The word intersection is used because the status structures commonly used by criminologist, and sociologist never occur alone. Another way of saying this is that scientists study a number of social demographics or correlates of crime at the same time. Thus, in this class women involvement in crime, whether as victims or as offenders, or as professionals engaged in the criminal justice system, a number of these variables have to be investigated (studied) at the same time. We will explore the nature and extent of women as victims, offenders, and workers in the criminal justice system. We will investigate the relationship between victimization and offending, and study the details of women in the criminal justice as offenders or workers (professional as law enforcement officers, court personnel, correctional workers, etc.) A major focus will be to learn about the major debates and topics within criminology relating to gender and crime. In addition to the above ideas, we will look at women fear of crime, women limited mobility economically, crime policies that impact the lives the women as victims, offenders, and professionals.