Crime and Punishment in History
History Workshop
Department of History, New York University
Professor Lauren Benton
Spring 2008
Tuesday, 2:00-4:45
This course focuses on crime and punishment as elements of legal culture across an array
of geographic and temporal settings. We begin with some works illustrating different
theoretical and methodological approaches to crime and punishment, then move to
discussion of monographs and articles addressing three overlapping themes: the social
history of crime and punishment in early modern Europe, the role of criminal law in
European colonialism, and the cultural significance of crime and punishment in United
States history. In addition to reading and discussing works by historians, students will
write papers analyzing primary sources such as court records, newspaper accounts of
trials, and works by legal reformers.