Fall 2020  |  SOC 4161 Section 001: Criminal Law in American Society (16630)

Instructor(s)
Class Component:
Lecture
Credits:
3 Credits
Grading Basis:
Student Option
Instructor Consent:
No Special Consent Required
Instruction Mode:
Completely Online
Class Attributes:
Online Course
Times and Locations:
Regular Academic Session
 
09/08/2020 - 12/16/2020
Wed 02:30PM - 05:00PM
Off Campus
UMN REMOTE
Enrollment Status:
Open (44 of 50 seats filled)
Also Offered:
Course Catalog Description:
Purposes of criminal law and of principles of criminal liability, justification, and excuse. Applications to law of criminal homicide, sexual assault, drugs, and crimes against property, public order, and morals. prereq: 3101 or 3102 or 3111 or instr consent; soc majors/minors must register A-F
Class Notes:
This course is completely online in a synchronous format. The course will meet online at the scheduled times. Click this link for more detailed course information: http://classinfo.umn.edu/?jbs+SOC4161+Fall2020
Class Description:

All parts of our class aim to help you develop your own "criminal law imagination" (CLI) By this I refer to your ideal blaming and punishing regime. We spend our Wednesday afternoons together interrogating a wide range of topics to help you develop your your CLI: Here are some:


1. What's criminal law and what's it good for?

2. Should we punish people only for what they do? or for what they might do? or even sometimes for who they are?

3. What are the justifications and excuses for committing crimes? Topics include defenses of justification (self-defense, defense of home) and defenses of excuse (insanity, age)

4. Partners in Crime: What should happen when teamwork hurts innocent people?

6. Uncompleted crimes: What should happen when people try to hurt other people but they fail?

5. What's the role of criminal law in unwanted sex?

6. What should happen to government officials sworn to serve and protect us and our constitutional rights, when they abuse their power?

7. How much protection should the Constitution provide to non citizens?

8. Cyberwar: How do we fight wars with malware on the internet instead of traditional weapons of war?


A final word: You'll probably learn some actual criminal law in our interactive journey through the topics in the list. Good for you. But, remember our goal is above all to work on developing your CLI.

Who Should Take This Class?:
If you're an Upper Division undergraduate from any major and you're interested in becoming a more intelligent consumer of our criminal blaming and punishing regime, then you've found the right class. That regime is a very rough engine of social control, a last resort after families, belief systems, schools, and other non criminal social institutions fail. It's also the most expensive and most invasive instrument to affect human behavior in the digital age of the US version of a constitutional democracy, committed to the values of human dignity, individual autonomy, equal justice, and social order.
Grading:

10% Class Participation measured mainly by discussion and SRS ("Clicker)" polling

90% Weekly quizzes that cover reading and discussion

Exam Format:

10%, analysis of week's assigned cases due on CANVAS at 230 on Wednesday

30% short answer quiz on each week's assigned reading taken at the beginning of class

50% reaction essay based on the day's discussion, due by midnight every Thursday on the day following discussion

10% iClicker participation

Class Format:

15% Lecture

85% Discussion, videos, and occasional guest lectures

Workload:
About 35 pages of reading every week. Hey! There are no research papers, reports, or other writing requirements. This is so you have time to read thoroughly and know well the content of the assigned pages.
Textbooks:
https://bookstores.umn.edu/course-lookup/16630/1209
Syllabus:
http://classinfo.umn.edu/syllabi/jbs_SOC4161_Fall2020.docx
Past Syllabi:
http://classinfo.umn.edu/syllabi/jbs_SOC4161_Fall2018.docx (Fall 2018)
Instructor Supplied Information Last Updated:
9 July 2020

ClassInfo Links - Fall 2020 Sociology Classes

To link directly to this ClassInfo page from your website or to save it as a bookmark, use:
http://classinfo.umn.edu/?subject=SOC&catalog_nbr=4161&term=1209
To see a URL-only list for use in the Faculty Center URL fields, use:
http://classinfo.umn.edu/?subject=SOC&catalog_nbr=4161&term=1209&url=1
To see this page output as XML, use:
http://classinfo.umn.edu/?subject=SOC&catalog_nbr=4161&term=1209&xml=1
To see this page output as JSON, use:
http://classinfo.umn.edu/?subject=SOC&catalog_nbr=4161&term=1209&json=1
To see this page output as CSV, use:
http://classinfo.umn.edu/?subject=SOC&catalog_nbr=4161&term=1209&csv=1
Schedule Viewer
8 am
9 am
10 am
11 am
12 pm
1 pm
2 pm
3 pm
4 pm
5 pm
6 pm
7 pm
8 pm
9 pm
10 pm
s
m
t
w
t
f
s
?
Class Title