Gender, Crime and Criminal Justice

Gender, Crime and Criminal Justice

QUESTION: Critically assess the problem of survivor criminalisation in the criminal justice response to domestic violence.

Topics covered in class.

WEEK 1 – THINKING GENDER, CRIME AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE & MEN, MASCULINITIES AND CRIME

• LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this week, you will have:

Thinking Gender, Crime and Criminal Justice

• • Developed an understanding of the key concepts: gender, sexuality and intersectionality.
  • An understanding of how feminist and queer theory has developed.
  • An overview of the theoretical debates in gender and criminal justice.

Men, Masculinities and Crime

• • Define masculinity and the obstacles in using the concept criminologically.
  • Situate masculinity as an explanation for men’s offending and the gender-crime ratio
  • Understand hegemonic masculinity, protest masculinities and gendered identities
  • Understand the complexities of male victimisation

WEEK 2 – WOMEN, FEMININITIES AND CRIME

• LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this week, you will:

• • Have an understanding of the social construction of women’s deviance through discourses of social control, pathology and ‘abnormality’ and ‘double deviance’.
  • Understand essentialist and non-essentialist frameworks on women’s use of violence.
  • Knowledge on how class and race complicates how women’s use of violence is depicted in the media and society more generally.

WEEK 3 – POLICING GENDER

·         LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this week you will:

Understand gender as an element of policing and police culture

Have knowledge of policing and gender-normativity

Understand gender relations between police, victims and offenders

WEEK 4 JUDGING GENDER IN THE COURTS

WEEK 4 – JUDGING GENDER IN THE COURTS

• LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this week you will:

• • Understand how gender operates  in the courtroom
  • Identify concerns around gender in court.
  • Understand some of the problems associated with a criminal justice system which assumes men are the defendants.

WEEK 5 – THE GENDERED PRISON

·         LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this week you will:

• Understand gender-responsive treatment: its logic, context and consequences.
• Have explored the needs of women in criminal justice and the risks-discourse
• Have an understanding of masculinity and femininity in prison cultures: resistance, power and instances of ‘double’ oppression.
• Be able to relay the arguments for and again differential treatment
• Explore the prison as homonormative and gender normative.
• Understand the needs of LGBT populations in prison.

WEEK 6 – VICTIM OR OFFENDER? CRIMINILISATION AND THE VICTIM/OFFENDER OVERLAP

·         LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this week you will:

• Identify key issues in criminalisation and domestic violence
• Distinguish between divergent feminist approaches to the domestic violence and criminal justice.
• Develop an understanding of contested constructions of ‘victim’ and ‘perpetrator’.
• Understand how survivors of domestic violence can become criminalised

WEEK 7 –  INTERSECTIONALITY AND SEXUAL VIOLENCE

& SEX WORK, PROSTITUTION AND TRAFFICKING

·         LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this week you will:

Intersectionality and Sexual Violence:

• Articulate the definitional problems concerning sexual assault and rape
• Identify where feminism and the law meet
• Engage in sociological theorising about violence utilising feminist literature
• Understand the ‘gender lens’ and the need for intersectionality

WEEK 8 – HATE CRIMES, GENDER AND SEXUALITY

·         LEARNING OUTCOMES

Hate Crimes, Gender and Sexuality

By the end of this week you will:

• Articulate the concept of hate crime
• Understand the construction of sexually motivated hate crime
• Provide responses to bias motivated/hate crimes

• Required Readings (See some attached articles)

• Day, A.S. & Gill, A.K. (2020) Applying intersectionality to partnerships between women’s organizations and the criminal justice system in relation to domestic violence, The British Journal of Criminology
• Dobash, R. P., Dobash, R. E., Wilson, M., & Daly, M. (1992). The myth of sexual symmetry in marital violence. Social Problems, 39, 71-91
• Recommended
• Hester, M. (2013) Who does what to whom? Gender and domestic violence perpetrators in English police. records European Journal of Criminology 10 (5) 623-637
• Richie, B. (2012) Black Women, Male Violence and the Build Up of the Prison Nation in Arrested Justice: Black Women, Violence, and America’s Prison Nation New York University Press
• Lees, S. (1997) ‘The Representation of the Body in Rape Trials’, in Ruling Passions: Sexual Violence, Reputation and the Law, Buckingham, Open University Press: pp. 71-88

• Carr, N., McAlister, S., and Serisier, T., (2016) Out on the Inside: The Rights, Experiences and Needs of LGBT People in Prison, Dublin: Irish Penal Reform Trust. http://www.iprt.ie/files/IPRT_Out_on_the_Inside_2016_EMBARGO_TO_1030_Feb_02_2016.pdf (Chapters 4, 5, 6 and 7)
• Lamble, S. (2013) ‘Queer Necropolitics and the Expanding Carceral State: Interrogating Sexual Investments in Punishment’, Law and Critique, 24: 229-253.

You are encouraged to  browse criminological, sociological and gender/feminist journals and read the latest research on topics that interest you.  Below are some recommended journals for general reading and research, particularly for your essay assignment.

• Feminist Criminology
• Violence Against Women
• The Sociological Review
• The British Journal of Sociology
• Critical Criminology
• Theoretical Criminology
• Punishment & Society
• Criminal Justice Matters
• Social & Legal Studies
• Crime, Media, Culture
• Crime & Justice
• Crime, Law & Social Change
• Policing and Society
• Feminist Legal Studies
• Feminists@Law
• Signs (the feminist journal
• Gender & Society
• Feminist Review
• Race & Class
• Men and Masculinities

The essay must draw from course materials (i.e. required course readings) as well as your own independent research. In particular, the essay must refer to a required or recommended reading from at least four different weeks.
The essay must have a clear introduction, overall argument and conclusion. The essay should not simply summarise reading materials, but needs to incorporate your own analysis and argumentation. Your argument needs to be supported by examples and evidence.
The essay must be properly referenced, using consistently the  University of West England Harvard referencing style and must answer directly the specific question by making an academic argument . Please include specific page numbers for all in-text references. Failure to properly reference will result in mark deductions and can result in referral to the academic misconduct committee.

Evaluation Criteria:

• Argument: Is the overall argument relevant, convincing, and compelling? Has the essay used arguments, evidence, and examples effectively?
• Structure: Is the essay well-organised, easy to follow, and clearly structured?
• Analysis: Does the essay develop careful, nuanced, and rigorous analysis? Does the essay demonstrate critical reflection and independent thinking?
•  Research: Does the essay demonstrate independent research beyond required readings? Does it make effective use of relevant, up-to-date scholarly sources?
• Substantive Material: Has the essay fully answered the question and engaged sufficiently with course themes, discussion, and readings?
• Citation: Does the essay consistently use proper academic referencing and citation?
• Written Style: Does the essay communicate ideas effectively? Is the writing engaging?
• Presentation: Is the essay well-presented, carefully proof-read and edited?
• Creativity: Does the essay demonstratives creativity, originality, and imagination? Does it take intellectual risks and try to think ‘outside the box’?
• Referencing: Is the essay properly and consistently referenced using The university of West England  Harvard referencing style?

Please use the attached articles and your independent research.

Note: Please you must use the attached Articles Wk 1A, Wk1 B and Wk 1C. You must choose one Article from each section 2A and B, 3 A and B, Lees 1997, article 4C, 5A and 6 A. This is because an article must be chosen from each week teachings to write the essay. You will also do your independent research. Please remember this is an academic essay.

Below is a link to the reference style.

https://www.uwe.ac.uk/library/info/refbuilder/