This book examines horror films through a critical criminological lens. Each chapter considers how the genre impacts audiences and their understanding of topics like place, crime, and identity.

From a look at classics like Psycho and Double Indemnity to recent films like Traffic and Thelma & Louise, Nicole Rafter and Michelle Brown show that criminological theory is produced not only in the academy, through scholarly research, but also in popular culture, through film. Criminology Goes to the Movies connects with ways in which students are already thinking criminologically through engagements with popular culture, encouraging them to use the everyday world as a vehicle for theorizing and understanding both crime and perceptions of criminality. The first work to bring a systematic and sophisticated criminological perspective to bear on crime films, Rafter and Brown's book provides a fresh way of looking at cinema, using the concepts and analytical tools of criminology to uncover previously unnoticed meanings in film, ultimately making the study of criminological theory more engaging and effective for students while simultaneously demonstrating how theories of crime circulate in our mass-mediated worlds. The result is an illuminating new way of seeing movies and a delightful way of learning about criminology.

Reviewers’ comments on the first edition “This is an excellent introductory textbook on youth and crime. It is excellent not only in its analysis of criminological questions about youthful offending, but also because it positions the debate within a wider context of the relationship between young people and society.” Young People Now “The style is lively and readable, and the reader is pointed unobtrusively within the text towards the work of the leading authors in the field… a thorough and thoughtful introduction to the subject.” Social Policy “a critical and scholarly summary of the state of research and theorizing around ‘youth and crime’ … This book provides a useful and challenging overview of the topic for undergraduate students.” The Times Higher Education Supplement This book is an accessible introduction to the subject of youth and crime. The author explores the social construction of childhood and youth, and looks at the role of the media in creating a strong association of young people with crime and disorder, which sustains processes of marginalization and exclusion and leads to frequent ‘panics’ about youth crime. The importance of media representations of race and gender in these processes are also explored. The second edition is substantially revised and updated to take account of new political events and legislative developments, including: A new chapter on the phenomenon of ‘cybercrime’ A critical examination of recent developments in youth justice policy A new chapter on the impact of globalization on young people, which raises major issues around poverty, war and the commercial exploitation of children. This is a key text for students in criminology, sociology, social policy, and cultural studies.

* How widespread is violence? * Why do people engage in various forms of violence? * What can be done to reduce the level of violence? Understanding Violent Crime provides a concise yet thorough and extensive account of the main explanations of violent behaviour. It draws upon sociological and psychological perspectives on violence as part of a coherent approach to the study of a phenomenon that raises wide public concern. There is also a focus on the ways in which violence is considered by the criminal justice system. Definitions of the main violent offences, including violent sexual offences, are discussed and some indication of the levels of sentencing in particular cases is provided. The final chapter then considers ways in which offenders are able to confront their violent behaviour within the criminal justice system. Frequent references to the definitions and treatment of violence in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the USA give the book a distinctive comparative perspective. The result is a wide-ranging and essential undergraduate text and a key reference for researchers in the field.

Standing at the intersection of criminology and philosophy, this book demonstrates the ways in which mythic movies and television series can provide an understanding of actual crimes and social harms. Taking three social problems as its subjects – capitalist political economy, structural injustice, and racism – the book explores the ways in which David Fincher’s Fight Club (1999), HBO’s Game of Thrones (2011–2019), and Jordan Peele’s Us (2019) offer solutions by reconceiving justice in terms of personal and collective transformation, utopian thinking, and the relationship between racism and elitism, respectively. In doing so, the authors set out a theory of understanding the world based on cinematic and televisual works of art and conclude with a template that establishes a methodology for future use. An Epistemology of Criminological Cinema is authoritative and accessible, ideal reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students, criminologists, philosophers, and film, television, and literary critics with an interest in social justice and social harm.

This book seeks to problematize knowledge and practices regarding 'male rape' and its relationship to feminism, examining this issue from a Foucauldian perspective. Feminist constructions of 'male rape' can plausibly be claimed to operate as a 'regime of truth', but one must question whether this is running counter to patriarchy.

This cutting-edge edited collection brings together 17 scholarly essays on two of cinema and television’s most enduring and powerful themes: law and crime. With contributions by many of the most prominent scholars in law, sociology, criminology, and film, Framing Law and Crime offers a critical survey of a variety of genres and media, integrating descriptions of technique with critical analysis, and incorporating historical and socio-political critique. The first set of essays brings together accounts of the history of the Law and Cinema Movement; the groundbreaking genre of “post-apocalyptic fiction;” and the policy-setting genesis of a Canadian documentary. The second section of the book turns to the examination of a range of international or global films, with an eye to assessing the strengths, frailties, and possible functions of law, as depicted in fictional cinema. After an international focus in the second section, the third section focuses on law and crime in American film and television, inclusive of both fictional and documentary modes of narration. This section’s expansion beyond film narratives to include television series attempts to broaden the scope of the edited collection, in terms of media discussed; it is also a nod to how the big screen, although still a dominant force in American popular culture, now has to compete, to some extent, with the small screen, for influence over the collective American popular cultural imaginary. The fourth section, titled brings together various chapters that attempt to instantiate how a “Gothic Criminology” could be useful, as an interpretative framework in analyzing depictions of law and crime in film and television. The fifth and final section covers issues of pedagogy, epistemology, and ethics in relation to moving images of law and crime. Merging wide-ranging analyses with nuanced scholarly interpretations, Framing Law and Crime examines key concepts and showcases original research reflecting the latest interdisciplinary trends in the scholarship of the moving image. It addresses, not only scholars, but also fans, and will heighten the appreciation of connoisseurs and newcomers to these topics alike.