Laurier Online Course
Welcome to Sociology 241OC, Sociology of Crime: Structural Perspectives!
This is an online course, OC, offered using mylearningspace.wlu.ca which is sometimes referred
to as MYLS or D2L (Desire2Learn).
Students should consult the webpage for the online centre for information about being an
online student: www.wlu.ca/page.php?grp_id=329&p=15195
The course is designed to promote your understanding of crime by providing you with the
intellectual tools that are needed to analyze the social interactions of crime. We need to
recognize that different theoretical perspectives can be used in the study of crime and society
and this course will familiarize you with the functional, class, neo-colonial, and gender
approaches.
The course is organized into 12 lessons. Since this term has 12 weeks, it is appropriate that
you cover at least 2 lessons per week. However, I strongly urge you to cover the lessons at a
faster pace since there is a significant amount of material towards the end of the course.
The course does not have a textbook. The course does not have a course package of readings.
Readings are listed below and are available through the library’s webpage using the Primo
Catalogue and on the MYLS for this course.
SY241OC
May 2012
Course Description
The purpose of the course is to teach you to think sociologically about crime. In so doing, to
recommend a social constructionist approach to crime, one uncontaminated by passing
‘correctional’ fads and fancies. More particularly, to provide exemplifications of how to use the
sociological perspectives of functionalism (FN), the structural conflict perspective (SCP), the
neo-colonial perspective (NCP), and the feminist conflict perspective (FCP). Finally, to show
how sociology can teach valuable insights into crime and how the study of crime can provide
an interesting vehicle for learning about sociology. We shall be using these approaches – FN,
SCP, NCP, FCP – to focus on five central issues in the study of crime:
How crime is made by the creation of law (claims-making activities);
How crime is made by the public (recognizing and reporting crime);
How crime is made by the enforcement of law (the police);
How crime is made by the administration of justice (the courts);
How crime is made by the application of punishment (corrections).
Writing Guidelines
Although there is no textbook and no course package of readings, students are advised that
they should consult the Writing Centre’s webpage for handouts about writing, paying
particular attention to #13 on citations and #15 on plagiarism:
www.wlu.ca/page.php?grp_id=306&p=3115
Students are advised that they should consult the department’s Essay Writing Guidelines:
www.wlu.ca/documents/27298/Essay_Writing_Guidelines_Updated_March_28%2C2012.pdf
Communication Policy
My policy is to respond to emails and bulletin board messages on a daily basis. That is, if you
email or post a message one day, at some point no later than the evening of the next day, I
will provide a response. Messages of a general interest to the class should be posted to the
Discussions. Messages of a personal concern should be sent to me as an email.
Do not use the MyLS email to send emails to me. MYLS email has a d2l in the email address.
Send an email directly to me at mmanley@wlu.ca using your regular WLU email or some other
reliable email system.
If, for some reason, you are having trouble accessing the MYLS for this course, you should
contact the Online Office:
www.wlu.ca/homepage.php?grp_id=329
SY241OC
May 2012
The Grades
Participation #1
Midterm
Participation #2
Term Paper
Final Exam
5%
20%
5%
30%
40%
Tuesday May 15 to Tuesday May 22, inclusive
Thursday May 24
Friday June 1 to Friday June 8, inclusive
noon Monday June 11
official exam period: Thursday June 21 to Monday June 25
*** The last day to drop the course without academic penalty is Monday June 4. ***
It is the student's responsibility to be available to take midterm and final examinations at the scheduled
times. The midterm and the final exam are not done online. They are written at a specific location.
Students must confirm the date and location of the midterm at this webpage before they write it:
www.wlu.ca/page.php?grp_id=329&p=11774
The midterm exam will deal with the material covered in the first four lessons of the course. You can
access the questions which may appear on the midterm test by clicking on the file for potential Midterm
Questions. The midterm will be 1.5 hours long. You will answer three questions out of five. The
questions require essay answers emphasizing the importance of the structural perspectives and their
concepts. Your midterm will be mailed back to you.
The final examination will be scheduled at the end of the course in the official examination period, June
21-25, at a location to be announced. It will deal with the material covered in the last eight lessons of
the course. You can access the questions which may appear on the final exam by clicking on the file for
potential Exam Questions. The exam will be 2 hours long. You will answer five questions out of seven.
The questions require essay answers emphasizing the importance of the structural perspectives and
their concepts.
Students are advised that since there is a substantial amount of material being covered in the course,
answers for the exams are expected to be of sufficient length to do justice to the material. Although this
course is being taught online during the summer months, that does not mean it is going to be easy.
Short meagre answers are unlikely to do well. Students are advised that SY241 is a course in structural
theory and there will be no marks given for work on interpretive theory which is covered in SY242.
Students are advised that this is a course about crime. In particular, it is not a social problems course
and it is not a deviance course and it is not a mass media course. We must have crime and
criminalization in all answers and the term paper; and we must not have social problems or deviance or
mass media studies.
A list of potential questions is posted for the midterm and the final exam. I do not answer or comment
about my own questions. Students are welcome to work with each other in order to prepare answers.
Normally this is organized on the Discussions bulletin board, I will set up a forum for this. Students
typically share their work using google docs or email; this way I cannot observe what you are doing.
There is no requirement that a student participate in the preparation and sharing of answers. In my
experience the best students are not inclined to share their work because they give up more than they
get. Thus you should not interpret the shared answers as being good answers, let alone the best
answers.
Students are expected to download all relevant course material to their own computers early in the
course. Any failure of MYLS or the library’s webpage to function properly will not be a basis for a
deferred midterm or final exam, and will not be the basis for a extension for the assignment.
SY241OC
May 2012
Course Outline
1.
Sociology and Crime
 Cohen, Stanley. 1999. “Moral panics and folk concepts.” Paedagogica Historica. 35(3):585591.
 Millie, Andrew. 2011. “Value judgments and criminalization.” British Journal of
Criminology. 51(2):278-294.
2.
Functionalism: Society Creates Crime
 Cloward, Richard. 1959. “Illegitimate means, anomie, and deviant behavior.” American
Sociological Review. 24(2):164-176.
 Ericson, Richard V. 2007. “Rules in policing: five perspectives.” Theoretical Criminology.
11(3):367-401.
3.
Functionalism: Society Uses Crime
 Trotter, R. Clayton, Susan Day, and Amy Love. 1989. “Bhopal, India and Union Carbide: the
second tragedy.” Journal Of Business Ethics. 8(6):439-454
 Kramer, Ronald C., Raymond Michalowski, and David Kauzlarich. 2002. “The origins and
development of the concept and theory of state-corporate crime.” Crime and
Delinquency. 48(2):263-282.
4.
Class Conflict Perspective: Capitalism Creates Crime
 Spritzer, Steven. 1975. “Toward a Marxian theory of deviance.” Social Problems. 22(5):638651.
 Mitrani, Sam. 2009. “Reforming repression: labor, anarchy, and reform in the shaping of
the Chicago police department, 1879 –1888.” Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of
the Americas. 6(2):73-96.
5.
Criminalizing Property
 Tillman, Robert. 2009. “Making the rules and breaking the rules: the political origins of
corporate corruption in the new economy.” Crime, Law and Social Change. 51(1):73-86.
 Friedrichs, David. 2009. “Exorbitant CEO compensation: just reward or grand theft?” Crime,
Law and Social Change. 51(1):45-72.
6.
Criminalizing Class
 Snider, Laureen. 2004. “Poisoned water, environmental regulation and crime: constituting
the nonculpable subject in Walkerton, Ontario.” Pp. 155-184 in What is Crime? Defining
Criminal Conduct in Contemporary Society edited by Law Commission of Canada.
Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.
 Tombs, Steve. 2007. “‘Violence’, safety crimes and criminology.” British Journal of
Criminology. 47(4):531-550.
SY241OC
May 2012
Course Outline
7.
Criminalizing Aboriginals: Imperialism Creates Crime
 Ward, Tony. 2005. “State crime in the heart of darkness.” British Journal of Criminology.
45(4):434-445.
 Aas, Katja Franko. 2007. “Analyzing a world of motion: global flows meet ‘criminology of
the other.’” Theoretical Criminology. 11(2):283-303.
8.
Criminalizing Race: Neo-colonialism Creates Crime
 Harris, David A. 2006. “U.S. experiences with racial and ethnic profiling: history, current
issues, and the future.” Critical Criminology. 14(3):213-239.
 Hallsworth, Simon. 2006. “Racial targeting and social control: looking behind the police.”
Critical Criminology. 14(3):293-311.
 Chan, Wendy. 2004. “Undocumented migrants and Bill C-11: the criminalization of race.”
Pp. 34-60 in What is Crime? Defining Criminal Conduct in Contemporary Society edited by
Law Commission of Canada. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.
9.
Criminalizing Terrorism
 Chomsky, Noam. 2002. “Terror and just response.” ZNet.
www.chomsky.info/articles/20020702.htm
 Welch, Michael. 2003. “Trampling human rights in the war on terror.” Critical Criminology.
12(1):1-20.
10. Practicing Punishment
 Martel, Joane, Renée Brassard, and Mylène Jaccoud. 2011. “When two worlds collide:
aboriginal risk management in Canadian corrections.” British Journal of Criminology.
51(2):235-255.
 Chan, Wendy. 2005. “Crime, deportation and the regulation of immigrants in Canada.”
Crime, Law and Social Change. 44(2):153-180.
11. Feminist Conflict Perspective: Patriarchy Creates Crime
 Frazier, Carolyn and Dorothy Roberts. 2006. “Victims and villains in murder by abortion
cases from the turn-of-the-Twentieth-Century Chicago.” TriQuarterly. 124:63-78.
 Irving, Toni. 2008. “Decoding black women: police practices and rape prosecutions on the
streets of Philadelphia.” NWSA Journal. 20(2):100-120.
 Ahmetbeyzade, Cihan. 2008. “Gendering necropolitics: the juridical-political sociality of
honor killings in Turkey.” Journal of Human Rights. 7(3):187-206.
12. Criminalizing Women
 Surtees, Rebecca. 2008. “Traffickers and trafficking in southern and eastern Europe.”
European Journal of Criminology. 5(1):39-68.
 Campbell, Kirsten. 2003. “Rape as a ‘crime against humanity’: trauma, law and justice in
the ICTY.” Journal of Human Rights. 2(4):507-515.
SY241OC
May 2012
Participation
Participation #1 will be based on the readings for lessons 2, 3, and 4. Participation #2 will be
based on the readings for lessons 5, 6, 7, and 8.
Participation #1 will take place during Tuesday May 16 to Tuesday May 22, inclusive. I will
open a forum on the Discussions bulletin board for this course. The forum will begin when I
place a link to some news material. Your task is to use one of the readings for lessons 2, 3, and
4 to analyze the news. Each student will provide one and only one response. You must provide
your response during the specified time period as stated above. When the time period is up,
no more contributions will be permitted. Your interpretation of the news is to be based on the
reading you choose to use. At the end of your contribution, you must state the page numbers
of the reading that you have used. You do not and must not provide your opinion of the
news. You must not repeat or refer to what other students have already said. (This means that
you will have to read the earlier postings to ensure that you are not being repetitious.) Your
interpretation of the news may not and must not refer to any other source; the statement you
provide must be your work and only your work and you must not receive help of any sort from
any source (other than the readings and lessons for this course); any violation of this
requirement is academic misconduct. Refer to the link below, listed on the last page, for a link
to a discussion of academic misconduct. Your statement must consist of 200 to 300 words. If
you have too many or too few words, your mark will be zero. If your express your personal
opinion, your mark will be zero. If you do not meet the requirements as stated here, your mark
will be zero. Normally students will get all or most of the 5 marks for this participation mark as
long as they provide a legitimate and credible interpretation of the news. There will be more
than one forum for participation #1 in order to give students some choice; if so, students must
respond only once to one forum for participation #1.
Participation #2 will take place during Friday June 1 to Friday June 8, inclusive. Participation #2
has the same requirements as participation #1, except will be based on the readings for
lessons 5, 6, 7, and 8. You will choose one and only one reading to use.
It is the responsibility of each student to be available as needed during each time slot. It is the
responsibility of each student to have an internet connection as needed during each time slot.
Any failure of mylearningspace to function is not a legitimate reason for not providing a
participation. If you provide a reason for not being available to make a participation (a medical
reason or a death in the family or a significant accident), you must be incapacitated for all 8
days of a time slot. A rational student will make their contribution early in each of the specified
time slots.
SY241OC
May 2012
Term Paper
(you should read every word of these instructions very carefully)
The term paper has four parts. Each part should be clearly labelled. Each of the four parts is important.
There should be no introduction and no conclusion. The term paper has exactly three references. There
are no exceptions to this rule. You are not permitted to refer to any reference except the three explicit
references that you are using.
In part one, select an article that explicitly applies a structural sociological theory (functionalism, the
structural conflict perspective, the neo-colonial perspective, and the feminist conflict perspective) to a
specific activity or topic that relates to criminalization. The theory must explicitly refer to the police or
the courts. The article must be available online as a pdf file from the library’s Primo Catalogue. The article
must make an original contribution to theory and must not be a review. Outline and discuss the important
concepts of the theory as developed in the article and review how the theory is used to interpret the
activity.
In part two, provide a substantial critique of the analysis of the article, discussed in part 1, that focuses on
the theory being presented in that article. The critique will be your critique. Provide a theoretical advance
(such as a new concept, idea, variable, stage, or process) that deals with the critique that you have
provided. Provide a reference for your critique and theoretical advance which is available online as a pdf
file from library’s Primo Catalogue.
In part three, select some ‘news events’ that take the form of the description of a case study. The case
study will be found in a newspaper. Students are encouraged to use the library’s news resources at:
library.wlu.ca/subject/news or the news component of google at: news.google.com for a suitable source.
The ‘news events’ must refer to the description of some events which have not been subject to analysis of
any sort. You must refer to exactly one news event as reported in one reference. The news events must
not be a report of any government or official agency and must not be numerical in nature. The case study
must refer to an activity similar to the activity discussed in part one. The case study must have sufficient
detail to sustain a sociological analysis. Apply the theory of the first article so as to interpret the events
described in the news. Your application of the theory should make use of the concepts discussed in part
one.
In part four, make use of the theoretical advance (such as a new concept, idea, variable, stage, or process)
discussed in part two to further develop the news analysis. Discuss how the analysis of the news is
improved by your use of the theoretical advance.
Students are strongly encouraged to find their articles and news early in the term.
An article (references 1 and 2) used as a reference for the term paper must not be an article that is used or
referred to extensively in this course. Each article must be available online from the Primo Catalogue and
must be published in a scholarly refereed sociology journal. Each article must use a structural sociological
theory (functionalism, the structural conflict perspective, the neo-colonial perspective, and the feminist
conflict perspective). Each article must not be overly focused on the reporting of research. Each article
must not report or use quantitative or statistical methods. Articles must not use interpretive theory;
articles must not refer to social problems or to deviance instead of crime; articles must not refer to the
mass media. All aspects of the term paper must deal with crime: the theory, the substantial critique, the
theoretical advance, and the case study. Each reference must clearly deal with the aspect of crime that is
being studied.
SY241OC
May 2012
If you use words taken from an article, they must be in quotation marks. You may not paraphrase the
words from any source. Any words not in quotation marks must be your words and not words from any
other source.
Students will normally find references 1 and 2 by going to the library’s web page and using one of the
search procedures to find the articles. It usually works better if you find both references at the same time.
Another tactic is to find an article, not discussed in this course, written by one of the author’s referred to
in this course. Another tactic is to go to specific journals that deal with the sociology of crime and
consider what has been published there. Another tactic is to look at the references for the readings used
in this course. Thus there are four strategies for finding appropriate articles. If one tactic does not work,
try another.
Use an in-line parenthetical format to refer to references in the term paper, such as (Jenkins, 2002:12). You
must use the format of the readings of this course outline when you cite your references. Provide
references at the end of the term paper using the format found in this course outline. You may refer to
the Canadian Review of Sociology for additional examples. You must specify the journal, the volume, the
issues, and the page numbers. Do not use footnotes. Do not use endnotes. There will be exactly three
references: 1) for the theory, 2) for the critique and theoretical advance, and 3) for the news. You must
have exactly one reference for each part of the first three parts; there are absolutely no exceptions to this.
Each part is equally important. If your references are incomplete or inappropriate you will lose marks.
The term paper is marked out of 30 and is worth 30% of the final grade. The term paper should have
between 2800 and 3000 words, including absolutely every word. If your term paper has more than 3000
words you will lose 4 marks out of the 30 marks. You may submit a term paper with less than 2800 words,
understanding that it is unlikely that you will have adequately done what you have been asked to do. The
term paper is due by noon Monday June 11. It must be emailed to the Online Office by that time; send it
as an attachment to onlineassign@wlu.ca. A late assignment, without a legitimate reason, will be
penalized 4 marks out of the 30. A term paper will not be accepted if it is over one week late. The term
paper must absolutely be emailed to the Online Office by noon Monday June 18 in order to get any
marks. If you are running out of time, you should submit a partial term paper rather than nothing. Do not
mail it; do not fax it; do not deliver it in person. The only exceptions will be for a legitimate reason: a
medical reason or a death in the family.
Students should consult the Online Learning webpage for information about assignments:
www.wlu.ca/page.php?grp_id=329&p=15195
Students are required to retain a print copy and an electronic copy of their assignment. The copy printed
by the Online Office will not be returned to you. Students are required to submit their term paper to:
www.turnitin.com If the assignment is not submitted to turnitin by the due date (whichever due date you
are meeting), it will receive a mark of zero. The extended turnitin due date is only for those who have
been granted an extension by me for a legitimate reason. Use this information:
class id:
password:
5086341
police
You must print the turnitin id receipt number on the cover page of the term paper. If you do not, you will
lose 2 marks out of the 30. This means that you must submit the term paper to turnitin in order to get the
turnitin receipt number, which you then put on the cover page before submitting the term paper to the
online office. You must print the total word count on the cover page. If you do not you will lose 2 marks
out of the 30.
Notices
Student Awareness of the Accessible Learning Centre:
Students with disabilities or special needs are advised to contact Laurier’s Accessible Learning Centre for
information regarding its services and resources. Students are encouraged to review the Calendar for
information regarding all services available on campus. Guidelines regarding the consideration of such
students can be obtained by contacting the Accessible Learning Centre, ext. 3086,
waterloo.mylaurier.ca/accessible/info/home.htm
Academic and Research Misconduct:
Academic misconduct is an act by a student, or by students working on a team project, which may result
in a false evaluation of the students(s), or which represents a deliberate attempt to unfairly gain an
academic advantage. Academic misconduct includes: please refer to web site:
www.wlu.ca/page.php?grp_id=2505&p=11452
Wilfrid Laurier University uses software that can check for plagiarism. Students may be required to submit
their written work in electronic form and have it checked for plagiarism.
Examination Deferrals:
The academic date section of the 2011/2012 calendar, web site:
www.wlu.ca/calendars/section.php?cal=1&s=442&sp=1464&ss=1888&y=49
(Deferred Examination Policy section) clearly states the examination policy and date period for each
semester. Students must note that they are required to reserve this time in their personal calendars for
the examinations. Students who are considering registering to write MCAT, LSAT or GMAT or a similar
examination, should select a time for those examinations that occurs outside the University examination
period.
For additional information regarding special circumstances for examination deferment, consult the
Examination Policy web site and check the Deferred Examination Policy section:
www.wlu.ca/calendars/section.php?cal=1&s=442&sp=1464&ss=1888&y=49
(Special Examinations section) of the 2011/2012 University on-line calendar.
The up to date, official Academic Calendar is posted on Wilfrid Laurier University’s web site:
www.wlu.ca
Go to Academic Info / Academic Calendars / Undergraduate Academic Calendar / 2011-2012.