92 research outputs found
Staging women in prisons: Clean Break Theatre Companyâs dramaturgy of the cage
The article explores the limitations of the dramaturgies of the cell through a close reading of several key play texts commissioned by the UKâs leading arts in criminal justice organisation working with women, Clean Break. The apparently humanist positioning of women in prison as just like everyone else erases the specificity of womenâs backstories. Conversely, by adhering to the constructions of female prisoners as holding binary positions of either âmonstersâ or âvictimsâ of the system, plays can re-inscribe morally unitary approaches to womenâs deviance and resistance. Many plays about women in prison hold a claim for resisting stereotypes and are in opposition to the injustice of criminal justice processes, and yet, in the realist mode, the monster/ victim position seems to be an inescapable binary
Changing Fortunes: Criminology and the Sociological Condition
Criminology and its relationships with sociology are today at a crossroads, and this article explores the changing fortunes of each as they have evolved over the last 50 years. The separation has occurred as criminology has successfully established itself as an independent subject with an impressive ability to attract students, scholars and research grants. Some see the striking expansion of criminology and move away from the basic disciplines as an indication of success and impressive achievement, while others are more sceptical and highlight the costs such isolation brings. The article examines the consequences of these changes, then it focuses on the fates of some of the key concepts in sociological criminology, before concluding that social theory can be a unifying force, capable of reinvigorating the ties between the two disciplines
Documentary criminology: Girl Model as a case study
Visual and cultural criminology are integrated with documentary filmmaking to develop a theoretically grounded, practice-based approach called âdocumentary criminologyâ. The first section establishes the need for documentary filmmaking in criminology and outlines methodological opportunities. The second section examines theoretically the aesthetics and substance of documentary criminology. The third section takes the film Girl Model (Redmon and Sabin, 2011) as a case study to demonstrate how documentary criminology embedded in lived experience (in this case, the experience of scouts that recruit young Russian girls, purportedly for the modelling industry) can depict sensuous immediacy. The final section contrasts the aesthetic and ethical consequences of documentary criminology within Carrabineâs (2012, 2014) concept of âjustâ images to a documentary filmmaking approach that remains interpretively open-ended. Readers can access Girl Model at https://vimeo.com/29694894 with the password industry
Punishment in the Frame: Rethinking the History and Sociology of Art
Images of punishment have featured prominently in Western art and this article explores what might be learnt from studying such pictures of suffering. It seeks to develop an approach to the visual that avoids both the essentialism of art history and the reductionism of sociology by offering a rethinking of the relationships between the two. It begins by setting out the current state of the sociology of art, before discussing ânewâ art histories that are inspired by social analysis. It then concentrates on how images of punishment have featured in Western art. This substantive material provides a rich resource to understand the force of representation and offers an opportunity to develop an aesthetic sociology that avoids some of the problems identified in the article. The approach developed in the second part is one that seeks to elaborate an aesthetic sociology that combines a historical sensitivity to images with the analytical concerns of social science. It strives to extend the art historian Michael Baxandallâs writings toward more sociological interpretations of visual analysis
Geographies of landscape: Representation, power and meaning
Green criminology has sought to blur the nature-culture binary and this article seeks to extend recent work by geographers writing on landscape to further our understanding of the shifting contours of the divide. The article begins by setting out these different approaches, before addressing how dynamics of surveillance and conquest are embedded in landscape photography. It then describes how the ways we visualize the Earth were reconfigured with the emergence of photography in the 19th century and how the world itself has been transformed into a target in our global media culture
Unsettling Appearances: Diane Arbus, Erving Goffman and the Sociological Eye
Both the photographer Diane Arbus and sociologist Erving Goffman were fascinated by the way we present ourselves to others and this paper sets out how each understood the drama of human interaction. It begins by exploring how their work parallels some developments in the sociology of deviance, and notes how Goffman was one of the earliest critics of this field, before briefly sketching out Arbusâs controversial career and then turning to a more detailed look at three of her images. It concentrates on how the gap between intention and effect, or what Goffman terms the difference between the impressions we âgiveâ and those we actually âgive offâ, are at the core of her work and this sociological insight animates her compositions. The paper then describes how their work unsettles ânormal appearancesâ and provides rich resources for understanding human conduct
Paul Nizan: conspiracy and the contemplation of crime
Paul Nizan (1905-1940) is also known in France as the âimpossible communistâ, for his long-term allegiance to the Party and the abrupt cancellation of his membership, in the late 1930s, following the Nazi-Soviet pact. This paper discusses a number of his writings, focusing particularly on his best known novel, The Conspiracy, where a revolutionary cell plans illegal political action. Conflict, nihilism, suicide and betrayal are among the topics stemming from the novel, which will be examined from a criminological perspective. The analysis will primarily address âculturalâ aspects of crime and refer to notions such as âthrillâ and âseductions of crimeâ among others. These notions, it will be argued, require some revision in the face of the imagined or actual criminality described in the novel
The âone who knocksâ and the âone who waitsâ: Gendered violence in Breaking Bad
This article provides a cultural criminological analysis of the acclaimed US television series, Breaking Bad. It is argued here that â as a cultural text â Breaking Bad is emblematic of an agenda for change surrounding criminological theories of peoplesâ propensity to do harm to one another. To exemplify this, the showâs central (male) protagonist is revealed to undergo a complete biosocial transformation into a violent offender and, as such, to demonstrate the need for criminological theory to recognise and further reflect upon this process. However, at the same time, the (re)presented inability of the showâs female characters to do the same is indicative of a number of gender-related questions that progressive criminological theories of violence need to answer. In considering these two fields in tandem, the showâs criminological significance is established; it is symbolic of the need for criminology to afford greater recognition to the nuanced intersections of both biological and sociological factors in the genesis and evolution of violent human subjectivities
Traces of violence: Representing the atrocities of war
This article explores the relationships between war and representation through the use of visual images, and takes a cue from the French cultural theorist Paul Virilio, who has written extensively on the militarization of vision in ways that have yet to be fully recognized in criminology. It then outlines some of the disputes surrounding documentary photography, not least since one of the main factors driving the development of the medium was the desire to record warfare, before turning to recent efforts to reconfigure the violence of representation by focusing on what has been termed âaftermath photographyâ, where practitioners deliberately adopt an anti-reportage position, slowing down the image-making process and arriving well after the decisive moment. This more contemplative strategy challenges the oversimplification of much photojournalism and the article concludes by reflecting on how military-turned-consumer technologies are structuring our everyday lives in more and more pervasive ways
âThereâs Plenty More Clunge in the Seaâ: Boyhood Masculinities and Sexual Talk
This article sets out to analyze the dominant sexual discourses embedded and negotiated within the television sitcom The Inbetweeners. Sex is a highly visible element of the program, marking it as a prevailing feature of the life of the teenage boy, paradoxically natural yet problematic. The performances draw upon and reproduce governing discourses of sexuality and gender. Of the potential themes, three are considered here. First, sex is represented as ubiquitous within the boysâ narratives, an assumed attribute of (the transition to) the performance of successful adult masculinity. Second, individual (hetero) sexuality is policed through peer-led homophobic banter and humor. Third, girls are objectified by boys, demonstrating the role of gendered relations in the governance of femininity and the discursive sanctions, which define masculinity through objects of desire. This article reveals some of the sexual subjecthoods made available to young men through televised representation, and considers their position within the wider sexual landscapes of boyhood
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