Are "deviant" and "criminal" behaviors inherently wrong or evil? Taking an innovative cross-cultural approach, Deviance Across Cultures spans the globe to give instructors an invaluable new resource for investigating the social construction of deviance. From studies on prostitution and drugs to examinations of religion and corporate deviance, this anthology--a collection of both classic and contemporary articles--responds to the growing need for interdisciplinary and global learning in deviance studies. To create a strong framework for inquiry, editor Robert Heiner has written a comprehensive introduction to each article that emphasizes the topic's relationship to theory and to ongoing trends affecting the United States and other countries. Throughout, careful attention to distant cultures will encourage students to understand deviance from an academic--and less emotional--perspective. Ideal as either a main text or a supplementary reader, this collection builds on classic deviance theory and basic sociological concepts to introduce students to this complex subject. With its rich global perspective, Deviance Across Cultures will challenge and expand students' assumptions about social deviance--both at home and abroad.

Are "deviant" and "criminal" behaviors inherently wrong or evil? Taking an innovative cross-cultural approach, Deviance Across Cultures: Constructions of Difference, Second Edition, spans the globe to give instructors and students an invaluable--and affordable--resource for investigating the social construction of deviance. From studies on sex and drugs to examinations of religious and corporate deviance, this anthology responds to the growing need for global learning in deviance studies.

This book explores the links between crime, deviance and popular culture in our highly-mediatised era, offering an insight into the cultural processes through which particular practices acquire a criminal or deviant status, and come to be seen as social problems. Adopting a multidisciplinary approach, the edited collection brings together international scholars across various areas of specialisation to provide an up-to-date analysis of some important and topical issues in 21st-century popular culture. The chapters look at different aspects of popular culture, including fictional detective narratives and the true crime genre, popular media constructions of sexual deviance and Islamophobia, sports, graffiti and outlaw biker subcultures. The authors examine a wide range of relevant case studies through a number of crime and deviance-related theories. Crime, Deviance and Popular Culture will be of importance to scholars and students across several disciplines, including criminology, sociology of deviance, social anthropology, media studies, cultural studies, television studies and linguistics.

Social deviance does not involve just criminal behavior—it’s any behavior that violates a cultural norm, and that can involve something as minor as consistently and deliberately wearing lively mismatched socks. Moreover, whether a crime, a sin, or simply unique taste, what’s considered deviant at one time and place can change, as when extensive tattooing and "body art" evolved from a sideshow carnival spectacle to a nearly universal rite of passage within U.S. culture. Drawing contributions from across the social and behavioral sciences, including sociology, anthropology, criminology, politics, psychology, and religion, the Encyclopedia of Social Deviance introduces students to this lively field of rule-making and rebellion that strikes at the core of what it means to be an individual living in a social world. Key Features: More than 300 articles are organized A-to-Z in two volumes available in both electronic and print formats. Articles, authored by key figures in the field, conclude with cross-reference links and further readings. Although organized A-to-Z, a thematic “Reader’s Guide” groups related articles by broad areas (e.g., Concepts; Theories; Research Methodologies; Individual Deviance; Organizational Deviance; etc.) as one handy search feature on the e-Reference platform, which also includes a comprehensive index of search terms.

Thinking About Deviance, second edition, explores how people participate in and produce the phenomena of deviance. Through nineteen brief and provocative chapters, such as 'Is Deviance Harmful or Helpful?', 'Once Deviant, Always Deviant?', and 'Do You Get the Time Because You Did the Crime?', the book examines how everyone is involved in the many facets of deviance. While a small portion of deviance may seem to be exotic, done by people on the fringe of society, deviance is an integral part of society and of conventional people's lives. By using everyday instances of deviance familiar to college students (such as shoplifting, academic cheating, underage drinking, and smoking) and examples from the media, the book engages readers and enables them to develop more general thinking about deviance. Through an interactive style in which the readers are asked questions and presented with hypothetical and actual situations for their thoughts, the book creates a 'conversation' with the readers. It encourages readers to think about and question deviance, including their participation in and their assumptions about it, in ways they are unlikely to have done before.

Moral panics reveal much about a society’s social structure and the sociology embedded in everyday life. This short text examines extreme reactions to American popular culture over the past century, including crusades against comic books, music, and pinball machines, to help convey the "sociological imagination" to undergraduates. Sternheimer creates a critical lens through which to view current and future attempts of modern-day moral crusaders, who try to convince us that simple solutions—like regulating popular culture—are the answer to complex social problems. Pop Culture Panics is ideal for use in undergraduate social problems, social deviance, and popular culture courses.

The field of linguistic anthropology looks at human uniqueness and diversity through the lens of language, our species' special combination of art and instinct. Human language both shapes, and is shaped by, our minds, societies, and cultural worlds. This state-of-the-field survey covers a wide range of topics, approaches and theories, such as the nature and function of language systems, the relationship between language and social interaction, and the place of language in the social life of communities. Promoting a broad vision of the subject, spanning a range of disciplines from linguistics to biology, from psychology to sociology and philosophy, this authoritative handbook is an essential reference guide for students and researchers working on language and culture across the social sciences.