With the rise of the #BlackLivesMatter movement and increasingly loud critiques of mass incarceration from both liberals and conservatives, the U.S. criminal system seems to be "on trial" in popular opinion and the mass media. Is our current system of punishment "racist" and are we at the "end" of mass incarceration? This special topics seminar examines social scientific understandings of the relationships between race, crime, and punishment in the U.S. during the 21st century. The seminar centers on relatively recent, path-breaking books on the intersection of punishment and race/ethnicity, class, and gender.
The course draws from the sociology of punishment, which sees the criminal justice system as a social institution rather than simply a mechanical response to crime. We focus on a wide array of social control forms (including police, courts, bail, prisons and community supervision, drug treatment, schools, and immigration detention). The core concerns aree key questions at the heart of the punishment and society scholarship: What determines the scope and character of criminal punishment? What is the role of crime, the social construction of law, and policing practices? How do imprisonment and other forms of penal control affect prisoners and ex-prisoners? For all of these questions, we will pay particular attention to the intersection of punishment and social inequalities, particularly the ways in which punishment reproduces divides based on race, class, gender, and national origin.