Students

CUL 326 – Criminal Bodies

2012 – D2

General Information

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Unit convenor and teaching staff Unit convenor and teaching staff Unit Convenor
Nikki Sullivan
Contact via nikki.sullivan@mq.edu.au
Credit points Credit points
3
Prerequisites Prerequisites
39cp including 3cp in CUL units at 200 level
Corequisites Corequisites
Co-badged status Co-badged status
Unit description Unit description
This unit consists of a genealogical study of the ways on which bodies and selves have been constituted as dangerous and/or criminal. It considers Foucault's account of the transition in penal punishment in the early nineteenth century: from a focus on offense and penalty to an increasing focus on the figure of the criminal as a 'dangerous individual' whose nature must be discerned and who effects must be contained. We thus turn to the technologies of criminal identification developed by Cesare Lombroso, Alphonse Bertillon, Francis Galton and others. We then consider the ways in which the ideas and practices associated with nineteenth-century criminology continue to resonate in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. In order to do so we examine technologies such as fingerprinting, polygraphs, DNA testing, and so on, and consider how these practices and the assumptions that inform them operate in the context of popular culture.

Important Academic Dates

Information about important academic dates including deadlines for withdrawing from units are available at https://www.mq.edu.au/study/calendar-of-dates

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:

  • A clear understanding of shifting criminological constructions of the figure of the criminal.
  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A knowledge of, and capacity to effectively use, online archival resources
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.
  • A capacity to particpate effectively in debates about crime and criminality.

Assessment Tasks

Name Weighting Due
Tutorial participation 10% ongoing
Reseach exercise 10% Monday 3rd September
Essay 30% Wednesday 22nd September
Research project plan 10% Tuesday 16th October
Research Project 40% Monday 19th November

Tutorial participation

Due: ongoing
Weighting: 10%

Students are required to attend at least 70% of tutorials, to come to class prepared - having done the set readings - and to particpate in in-class discussion. Marks will be awarded on the basis of quantity and quality of contribution.


On successful completion you will be able to:
  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.
  • A capacity to particpate effectively in debates about crime and criminality.

Reseach exercise

Due: Monday 3rd September
Weighting: 10%

On Tuesday 28th August Dr Cathy Hawkins will give a lecture on online archival resources. At the end of the lecture students will be given a practical exercise which they will need to complete by Monday 3rd September. The aim of the exercise is to familiarise students with online resources, and to assist them to develop skills in effective usage of these resources. In order to complete the exercise students will need internet access (and a computer). In order to access the reqired databases students will need to be , or to become, members of the National Library of Australia.  


On successful completion you will be able to:
  • A knowledge of, and capacity to effectively use, online archival resources

Essay

Due: Wednesday 22nd September
Weighting: 30%

1500 word esay. This assessment task will require students to develop a critical analysis of the construction of criminal bodies in the nineteenth- and early twentieth-centuries.

This task is provides an opportunity for students to apply the discipline specific skills and knowledges to which they have been introduced to an analysis of the discursive construction of criminality. Students will be required to analyze not only the processes themselves, but also, the social, ethical, and poltical effects of such. The task is designed to help students to develop a critical awareness of inequality and injustice, and how these things are (re)produced in medicine, law, science, and so on.


On successful completion you will be able to:
  • A clear understanding of shifting criminological constructions of the figure of the criminal.
  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.

Research project plan

Due: Tuesday 16th October
Weighting: 10%

Drawing on both the theoretical texts, and the online archival resources introduced in the unit, students are required to design a research project in which they will play the role of the detective, and critically analyse that role and its material effects. The plan should consist of a description of the person(s) and/or crime(s) that the reserach project will focus on, the archival and scholarly resources the student will use, the aim of the project, and its historico-political significance.

 


On successful completion you will be able to:
  • A clear understanding of shifting criminological constructions of the figure of the criminal.
  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A knowledge of, and capacity to effectively use, online archival resources

Research Project

Due: Monday 19th November
Weighting: 40%

3,000 words. This assessment task provides an opportunity for innovation and creation. It requires students to identify an individual with a documented 'criminal history', to undertake research to identify as many sources of information as possible about the person/crime(s), and to critically engage with both the discursive construction of the chosen figure, and the 'technologies of detection' deployed by the student.


On successful completion you will be able to:
  • A clear understanding of shifting criminological constructions of the figure of the criminal.
  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A knowledge of, and capacity to effectively use, online archival resources
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.
  • A capacity to particpate effectively in debates about crime and criminality.

Delivery and Resources

Lectures for this unit are on Tuesday, 1-2pm in C5A 232.

There is an iLearn site for this unit. This is where you will find lecture slides, announcements, assessment instructions, and a link to audio recordings of lectures.

 

Some of the assessment tasks in this unit require access to a computer and to the internet. In order to complete the first assessment task students will need to be able to access GALE digital newspaper archives. These are available online though the National Library of Australia. However, you need to be a member of the library to gain access to the databases. Given this, it is strongly recommended that all students apply for membership no later than the end of week two (ie Friday 10th August) as applications take up to two weeks to process.

Unit Schedule

 

Week 1: Intro to the unit

 

Week beginning Monday 30th July

 

(no readings this week)

 

 

 

Week 2: Criminology and its subjects

 

Week beginning Monday 6th August

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Rafter, Nicole (2008) ‘Phrenology: The Abnormal Brain’, in The Criminal Brain: Understanding Biological Theories of Crime, New York: New York University Press, pp.40-64.

 

·         Rafter, Nicole (2008) ‘Criminal Anthropology: The Atavistic Brain’, in The Criminal Brain: Understanding Biological Theories of Crime, New York: New York University Press, pp.65-88.

 

 

 

Week 3: Dangerous individuals and the discourses that make them be

 

Week beginning Monday 13th August

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Foucault, Michel (1978) ‘About the Concept of the “Dangerous Individual” in 19th-Century Legal Psychiatry’, International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, vol. 1, pp.1-18.

 

·         Alliume, Jean-Marie (1983) ‘The Riviere Beast, or the Unfinished Trial of the Creature who Tortured Birds and Frogs’, October, vol 24, pp.63-82.

 

 

 

Weeks 2 & 3 Further Readings:

 

·         Beaver, Kevin M. & Anthony Walsh (eds.) (2010) Biosocial Theories of Crime, Farnham: Ashgate.

 

·         Beirne, Piers (1993) Inventing Criminology: Essays on the Rise of ‘Homo Criminalis’, Albany: State University of New York Press.

 

·         Benedikt, Moriz (1881) Anatomical Studies Upon Brains of Criminals: A Contribution to Anthropology, Medicine, Jurisprudence, and Psychology, New York: W. Wood.

 

·         Gibson, Mary (2002) Born to Crime: Cesare Lombroso and the Origins of Biological Criminology, Westport: Praeger.

 

·         Godfrey, Barry S., Paul Lawrence & Chris A. Williams (2008) ‘Changing Perceptions of Criminality’, in History & Crime, London: Sage, pp.77-100.

 

·         Horn David G. (2003) The Criminal Body: Lombroso and the Anatomy of Deviance, New York: Routledge.

 

·         Leps, Marie-Christine (1992) Apprehending the Criminal: The Production of Deviance in Nineteenth-Century Discourse, Durham and London: Duke University Press.

 

·         Lombroso, Cesare (2006/1876) Criminal Man, N. Rafter and M. Gibson (trans.), Durham: Duke University Press.

 

·         Lombroso, Cesare and Guglielmo  Ferrero (2004/1893) Criminal Woman, the Prostitute and the Normal Woman, N. Rafter and M. Gibson (trans.), Durham: Duke University Press.

 

·         Lovitt, Carl L (1992) ‘The Rhetoric of Murderers’ Confessional Narratives: The Model of Pierre Riviere’s Memoir’, The Journal of Narrative Technique, 22:1, pp.23-34.

 

·         Morgan, George (1997) ‘The Bulletin and the Larrikin” Moral Panic in Late Nineteenth Century Sydney’, Media International Australia, no. 85, pp.17-23.

 

·         Rafter, Nicole (2008) The Criminal Brain: Understanding Biological Theories of Crime, New York: New York University Press.

 

·         Rafter, Nicole Hahn (1997) Creating Born Criminals, Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press.

 

·         Starr, Douglas (2011) The Killer of Little Shepherds: A True Crime Story and the Birth of Forensic Science, New York: Vintage.

 

·         Staum, Martin S. (2003) ‘The Ambivalence of Phrenology’, in Labeling People: French Scholars on Society, Race, and Empire 1815-1848, Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, pp.49-84.

 

·         Walby, Kevin & Nicolas Carrier (2010) ‘The Rise of Biocriminology: Capturing Observable Bodily Economies of “Criminal Man”’, Criminology and Criminal Justice, 10:3, pp.261-85.

 

·         Wasserman, David and Robert Wachbroit (eds.) (2001) Genetics and Criminal Behavior, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

·         Wetzell, Richard F. (2000) Inventing the Criminal: A History of German Criminology, 1880-1945, Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press.

 

·         Wiener, Martin J. (1994) Reconstructing the Criminal: Culture, Law and Policy in England, 1830-1914, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

 

 

Week 4: Picturing Crime (guest lecture by Peter Doyle)

 

Week beginning Monday 20th August

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Doyle, Peter (2007) ‘Public Eye, Private Eye: Sydney police mug shorts, 1912-1930’, Scan: Journal of Media Arts Culture, 4:3.

 

·         Biber, Katherine (2005) ‘Photographs and labels: Against a criminology of innocence’, Law Text Culture, pp.19-40.

 

Week 4: Further Readings:

 

·         Biber, Katherine (2007) Captive Images: Race, Crime Photography, New York: Routledge-Cavendish.

 

·         Biber, Katherine (2002) ‘The Hooded Bandit: Aboriginality, Photography and Criminality in Smith v. The Queen’, Current Issues in Criminal Justice, 13:3, pp.286-300.

 

·         Doyle, Peter (2007) City of Shadows: Sydney Police Photographs, Sydney 1912-1948, Sydney: Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales.

 

·         Doyle, Peter (2009) Crooks Like Us, Sydney: Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales.

 

·         Finn, Jonathan (2009) ‘Picturing the Criminal: Photography and Criminality in the Nineteenth Century’, Capturing the Criminal Image: From Mug Shot to Surveillance Society, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, pp.31-56.

 

·         Hayward, Keith J. & Mike Presdee (eds.) (2010) Framing Crime: Cultural Criminology and the Image, New York: Routledge.

 

·         Jager, Jens (2001) ‘Photography: A Means of Surveillance? Judicial Photography 1850-1900’, Crime, History and Societies, 5:1, pp.2-23.

 

·         Michaelson, Mark & Steven Kasher (2009) Least Wanted, New York: Steidl.

 

·         Lalvani, Suren (2006) Photography, Epistemology and the Body’, Cultural Studies, 7:3, pp.442-65.

 

·         Rafter, Nicole (2007) ‘Crime, Film and Criminology: recent sex-crime movies’, Theoretical Criminology, 11:3, pp.403-2-.

 

·         Thomas, Ronald R. (1995) ‘Making Darkness Visible: Capturing the Criminal and Observing the Law in Photography and Detective Fiction’,  C. T. Christ and J. O. Jordan (eds.) Victorian Literature and the Victorian Visual Imagination, Berkeley: University of California Press.

 

 

 

Week 5: Playing the detective: Resources (Guest lecture by Cathy Hawkins)

 

Week beginning Monday 27th August

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Crone, Rosalind (2009) ‘Crime and its Fabrication: A Review of New Digital Resources in the History of Crime’, Journal of Victorian Culture, 14:1, 125-34.

 

Week 5: Further readings:

 

·         Norton, Rictor (2005) ‘Recovering Gay History from the Old Bailey’, London Journal, 30:1, pp.39-54.

 

·         Shoemaker, Robert B (2008) ‘The Old Bailey Proceedings and the Representation of Crime and Criminal Justice in Eighteenth-Century London’, Journal of British Studies, vol. 47, pp.559-80.

 

·         Gray, Drew D (2010) ‘Review of The Old Bailey Proceedings Online’, Reviews in History, (http://www.history.ac.uk/reviews)

 

·         Devereaux, Simon (2007)’From Sessions to Newspaper? Criminal Trial Reporting, the Nature of Crime, and the London Press, 1770-1800’, London Journal, 32:1, pp. 1-27.

 

·         Myers, Norma (1988) ‘The Black Presence through Criminal Records, 1780-1830’, Immigrants & Minorities, 7:3, pp.292-307.

 

·         King, Peter (2007) ‘Newspaper reporting and attitudes to crime and justice in late eighteenth and early nineteenth century London’, Continuity and Change, 22:1, pp. 73–112.

 

Useful websites:

 

·         Historic Australian newspapers, 1803-1954. Available online:

 

http://newspapers.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/home

 

·         17th and 18th century Burney collection GALE CENGAGE Learning. Available online through The National Library of Australia, http://find.galegroup.com.rp.nla.gov.au/bncn/start.do?prodId=BBCN&userGroupName=nla

 

 

 

·         19th century British Library newspapers GALE Collection, Available online through the National Library of Australia, http://find.galegroup.com.rp.nla.gov.au/bncn/basicSearch.do;jsessionid=C97A18DFB2E2AA8D02C0CE4B339A3FC2

 

 

 

·         Last accessed 28 October 2010. [part of British newspapers 1600-1900]

 

·         www.ancestry.co.uk and www.ancestry.com  Ancestry is a huge finding aid with access to many records and links and growing all the time.

 

·         www.familysearch.org and pilot.familysearch.org a worldwide resource linked to the International Genealogical Index (IGI) compiled by the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints (the Mormons). Can be wrong, especially when information is uploaded by Members, without documentary evidence.

 

·         www.findmypast.com/ Findmypast.com (used to be www.1837online.com) fully transcribed 1841, 1861, 1871 and 1891 census records. Can do address search.

 

·         www.freecen.org.uk/ FreeCen Free census data, but partial. See www.freecen.org.uk/statistics.html for coverage. Also see FreeBMD and FreeReg.

 

·         www.nationalarchives.gov.uk TNA The National Archives (England) including English censuses by Ancestry.

 

·         www.rootsweb.com Rootsweb - a huge resource linked to http:/www.ancestry.com designed to connect people doing genealogical research; excellent forum and discussions.

 

·         www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk ScotlandsPeople (GROS), the official site for Scottish BMD, Censuses and Wills & Testaments.

 

·         www.ukbmd.org.uk/ UKBMD Birth, Marriage, Death records (partial).

 

·         www.visionofbritain.org.uk/ Vision of Britain, a useful site for historical context.

 

 

 

Week 6: Criminology, crime and race(ialization)

 

Week beginning Monday 3rd September

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Gabbidon, Shaun L. (2010) ‘Biological Perspectives on Race and Crime’, in Criminological Perspectives on Race and Crime, 2nd Edition, New York and London: Routledge, pp.9-44.

 

·         Webster, Colin (2008) ‘Marginalized White Ethnicity, Race and Crime’, Theoretical Criminology, 12:3, pp.293-312.

 

 

 

Week 6 : Further Readings:

 

·         Brewer, Rose M. & Nancy A. Heitzeg (2008) ‘The Racialization of Crime and Punishment: Criminal Justice, Color-Blind Racism, and the Political Economy of the Prison Industrial Complex’, American Behavioral Scientist, 51:5, pp.625-44.

 

·         Brown, Mark (2003) ‘Ethnology and colonial administration in nineteenth-century British India: the question of native crime and criminality’, The British Journal for the History of Science, 36:2, pp.201-19.

 

·         Chan, Wendy & Kiran Mirchandani (2002) Crimes of Color: Racialization and the Criminal Justice System in Canada, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

 

·         Covington, Jeanette (1995) ‘Racial Classification in Criminology: The Reproduction of Racialized Crime’, Sociological Forum, 10:4, pp.547-68.

 

·         Eberhardt, Jennifer L. et. al. (2004) ‘Seeing Black: Race, Crime and Visual Processing’, Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 87:6, pp.876-93.

 

·         Godfrey, Barry S., Paul Lawrence & Chris A. Williams (2008) ‘Immigration, Ethnicity, Race and Crime’, in History & Crime, London: Sage, pp.101-26.

 

·         Hogg, Russell (2001) ‘Penality and Modes of Regulating Indigenous Peoples in Australia’, Punishment & Society, 3:3, pp. 355-79.

 

·         Ludlow, Christa (1994) The reader investigates: Images of crime in the colonial city, Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies,7:2, pp.254-268.

 

·         McBratney, John (2005) ‘Racial and Criminal Types: Indian Ethnography and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Sign of Four’, Victorian Literature and Culture, 33:1, pp.149-67.

 

·         Muhammad, Kahlil Gibran (2010) The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime and the Making of Modern Urban America, Harvard University Press.

 

·         Peffley, Mark, Todd Shields & Bruce Williams (1996) ‘The Intersection of Race and Crime in Television News Stories: An experimental study’, Political Communication, 13:3, pp.309-27.

 

·         Russell-Brown, Katheryn (1998) The Color of Crime, New York: New York University Press.

 

·         Warner, Kate (2004) ‘Gang Rape in Sydney: Crime, the Media, Politics, Race and Sentencing’, Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 37:3, pp.344-61.

 

·         Welch, Kelly (2007) ‘Black Criminal Stereotypes and Racial Profiling’, Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 23:3, pp.276-88.

 

·         White, Jarrod (1997) ‘Power/Knowledge and Public Space: Policing the “Aboriginal Towns”’, Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 30:3, pp.275-91.

 

 

 

Week 7: The figure of the serial killer

 

Week beginning Monday 10th September

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Warwick, Alexandra (2006) ‘The Scene of the Crime: Inventing the Serial Killer’, Social & Legal Studies, 15:4, pp.552-69.

 

·         Zirngibl, Wendy M. (2010) ‘Wolves and Widows: Naming, Metaphors and the Language of Serial Murder’, in S. Waller (ed.) Serial Killers: Philosophy for Everyone, Oxford: Blackwell, pp.166-77.

 

Week 7: Further Readings:

 

·         Bartels, Ross & Ceri Parsons (2009) ‘The Social Construction of a Serial Killer’, Feminism & Psychology, 19:2, pp.267-80.

 

·         Caputi, Jane () ‘The New Founding Fathers: The Lore and Lure of the Serial Killer in Contemporary Culture’, Journal of American Culture, 13:3, pp.1-12.

 

·         Clarkson, Wensley (2008) Wolf Man: The true story of Francisco Arce Montes – the first global serial killer, London: John Blake Publishing.

 

·         Gregoriou, Christiana (2010) Language. Ideology and Identity in Serial Killer Narratives, New York: Routledge.

 

·         Holloway, Wendy (1981) ‘”I  Just Wanted to Kill a Woman”. Why? The Ripper and Male Sexuality’, Feminist Review, No. 9, pp.33-40.

 

·         Hutchinson, Philip (2009) The Jack the Ripper Location Photographs, Stroud: Amberley.

 

·         Jarvis, Brian (2007) ‘Monsters Inc.: Serial Killers and Consumer Culture’, Crime, Media, Culture, 3:3, pp.326-44.

 

·         Kelleher, Michael D. & C. L. Kelleher (1999) Murder Most Rare: The Female Serial Killer, New York: Dell.

 

·         Kidd, Paul B. (2000) Australia’s Serial Killers: The Definitive History of Serial Multicide in Australia, Sydney: Pan Macmillan.

 

·         Seltzer, Mark (1998) Serial Killers: Death and Life in America’s Wound Culture, London: Routledge.

 

·         Simpson, Philip L. (2000) Psycho Paths: Tracking the Serial Killer through Contemporary American Film and Fiction, Southern Illinois University Press.

 

·         Cameron, Deborah (1999) ‘Rosemary West: Motives and Meanings’, Journal of Sexual Aggression: An Interdisciplinary Forum for Research, Theory, and Practice, 4:2, pp.68-80.

 

·         Soothill, Keith (1993) ‘The Serial Killer Industry’, The Journal of Forensic Psychiatry, 4:2, pp.341-54.

 

·         Stone, Michael H. (2001) ‘Serial Sexual Homicide: Biological, Psychological and Social Aspects’, Journal of Personality Disorders, 15:1, pp.1-18.

 

·         Sugden, Philip (2006) The Complete History of Jack the Ripper, London: Constable & Robinson.

 

·         Waller, S. (ed.) Serial Killers: Philosophy for Everyone, Oxford: Blackwell.

 

 

 

 

 

MID SEMESTER BREAK MONDAY 17TH SEPT – FRIDAY 29TH September

 

 

 

Week 8: Women who kill

 

Week beginning Monday 1st October

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Hawkins, Cathy (2004) ‘The Monster Body of Myra Hindley’, Scan: Journal of Media Arts Culture, 1:3, http://www.scan.net.au/scan/journal/display.php?journal_id=40

 

·         Haebich, Anna (1998) ‘Murdering Stepmothers: The Trial and Execution of Martha Rendell’, Journal of Australian Studies, 22:59, pp.66-81.

 

Week 8: Further Readings:

 

·         Barton, Brenda (1997/8) ‘When Murdering Hands Rock the Cradle: An Overview of America’s Incoherent Treatment of Infanticidal Mothers’, SMU Law Review, vol. 51, pp.591-619.

 

·         Basilio, Miriam (1996) ‘Corporal Evidence: Representations of Aileen Wuornos’, Art Journal, 55:4, pp.56-61.

 

·         Chesney-Lind, Meda & Michele Eliason (2006) ‘From Invisible to Incorrigible: The Demonization of Marginalized Women and Girls’, Crime, Media, Culture, 2:1, pp.29-47.

 

·         Duggan, Lisa 2000) Sapphic Slashers: Sex, Violence and American Modernity, Durham: Duke University Press.

 

·         Grey, Daniel (2009) ‘”More Ignorant and Stupid than Wilfully Cruel”: Homicide Trials and Baby-Farming in England and Wales in the Wake of the Children Act 1908’, Crimes and Misdemeanors, 3:2, pp.60-77.

 

·         Hart, Lynda (1994) Fatal Women: Lesbian Sexuality and the Mark of Aggression, New York: Routledge.

 

·         Homrighaus, Ruth Ellen (2001) ‘Wolves in Women’s Clothing: Baby-Farming and the British Medical Journal, 1860-72, Journal of Family History, 26:3, pp.350-72.

 

·         Huckerby, Jayne (2003) ‘Women Who Kill their Children: Case Study and Conclusions Concerning the Differences in the Fall From Maternal Grace by Khoua Her and Andrea Yates’, Duke Journal of Gender, Law & Policy, 10:147, pp.149-72.

 

·         Meyer, Cheryl L. & Michelle Oberman () Mothers Who Kill Their Children, New York: New York University Press.

 

·         Myers, Wade C. et. al. (2005) ‘The Role of Psychopathy and Sexuality in a Female Serial Killer’, Journal of Forensic Sciences, 50:3, pp.1-6.

 

·         Oberman, Michelle (2003) ‘Understanding Infanticide in Context: Mothers who Kill, 1870, 1930 and Today’, The Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology, 92:3-4, pp.707-38.

 

·         Rapaport, Elizabeth (2005) ‘Mad Women and Desperate Girls: Infanticide and Child Murder in Law and Myth’, Fordham Urban Law Journal, 33:2, pp.100-142.

 

·         Schechter, Elizabeth & Harold Schechter (2010) ‘Killing with Kindness: Nature, Nurture, and the Female Serial Killer’, in S. Waller (ed.) Serial Killers: Philosophy for Everyone, Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, pp.117-28.

 

·         Smith, Abbe (2005) ‘The “Monster” in All of Us: When Victims Become Perpetrators’, Georgetown Law Faculty Publications, http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/facpub/219

 

·         Sussex, Lucy (1994) ‘Portrait of a Murderer in Mixed Media: Cultural Attitudes, Infanticide and the Representation of Frances Knorr’, Australian Feminist Law Journal, vol. 4, pp.39-54.

 

 

 

 

 

Week 9: Guest Lecture by author Fiona McGregor

 

Week beginning 8th October

 

No readings this week

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week 10: Biometrics (JP)

 

Week beginning Monday 15th October

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Pugliese, Joseph (2009) ‘Preincident Indices of Criminality: Facecrime and Project Hostile Intent’, Griffith Law Review, 18:2, pp.314-30.

 

Week 10: Further Readings:

 

·         Pugliese, Joseph (2011) Biometrics: Bodies, Technologies, Biometrics, London and New York: Routledge.

 

·         Magnet, Shoshana Amielle (2011) When Biometrics Fail: Gender, Race, and the Technology of Identity, Durham: Duke University Press.

 

·         Gates, Kelly A. (2011) Our Biometric Future: Facial Recognition Technology and the Culture of Surveillance, New York: New York University Press.

 

·         Walby, Kevin & Nicolas Carrier (2010) ‘The Rise of Biocriminology: Capturing Observable Bodily Economies of “Criminal Man”’, Criminology & Criminal Justice, 10:3, pp.261-85.

 

 

 

Week 11: Screening:  4 episodes of Grim Murders From History (episodes 1, 2, 5, 6)

 

Week beginning Monday 22nd October

 

No readings this week

 

 

 

Week 12: Forensics I: Reading the corpse

 

Week beginning Monday 29th October

 

Essential readings:

 

·         Crossland, Zoe (2009) ‘Of Clues and Signs: The Dead Body and its Evidentiary Traces’, American Anthropologist, 111:1, pp.69-80.

 

·         Pierson, David P. (2010) ‘Evidential Bodies: The Forensic and Abject Gazes in CSI: Crime Scene Investigation’,  Journal of Communication Inquiry, 34:2, pp.184-203

 

·         Penfold-Mounce, Ruth (2010) ‘Consuming Criminal Corpses: Fascination with the Dead Criminal Body’, Mortality, 15:3, pp.250-63.

 

 

 

Week 12: Further Readings:

 

·         Burney, Ian and Neil Pemberton (2011) ‘Bruised Witness: Bernard Spilsbury and the Performance of Early Twentieth-Century English Forensic Pathology’, Medical History, 55:1, pp.41-60. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3037214/

 

·         Campbell, Elaine (2009) ‘Reading/Writing Autopsy: A Dirty Theory of the Science of Death’, Science as Culture, 18:3, pp.313-31.

 

·         Close, Glen S. (2008) ‘Open Up a Few Corpses: Autopsied Cadavers in the Post-Boom’, Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies, 17:1, pp.121-37.

 

·         Eichhorn, Kate (2010) ‘Fieldnotes: A Forensic’, Cultural Studies <->Critical Methodologies, 10:2, pp.100-106.

 

·         Foltyn, Jacque Lynn (2008) ‘Dead Famous and Dead Sexy: Popular Culture, Forensics, and the Rise of the Corpse’, Mortality, 13:2, pp.153-73.

 

·         Glynn, Basil & Jeongmee Kim () ‘Corpses, Spectacle, Illusion: The Body as Abject and Object in CSI’, in M. Byers & V. M. Johnson (eds.) The CSI Effect: Television, Crime and Governance, Plymouth: Lexington Books, pp.93-110.

 

·         Hanson, Clare (2008) ‘Bestselling Bodies: Mourning, Melancholia and the Female Forensic Pathologist’, Women: A Cultural Review, 9:1, pp.87-100.

 

·         Landry, Deborah () ‘Faux Science and the Social Construction of a Risk Society: A Burkean Engagement with the CSI Debates’, Journal of the Institute of Justice & International Studies, No.9, pp.145-57.

 

·         Shone, Rob (2008) Corpses and Skeletons: The Science of Forensic Anthropology, New York: The Rosen Publishing Group.

 

·         Watson, Katherine D. (2011) Forensic Medicine in Western Society: A History, New York: Routledge.

 

 

 

Week 13: Forensics II: The CSI Effect

 

Week beginning Monday 5th November

 

Essential Readings:

 

·         Littlefield, Melissa M. (2011) ‘Historicizing CSI and its Effect(s): The Real and the Representational in American Scientific Detective Fiction and Print News Media, 1902-35’, Crime, Media, Culture, 7:2, pp.133-48.

 

·         Tait, Sue (2006) ‘Autopic Vision and the Necrophilic Imaginary in CSI’, International Journal of Cultural Studies, 9:1, pp.45-62.

 

Week 13: Further Readings:

 

·         Weissmann, Elke (2009) ‘Two Versions of the Victim: Uncovering Contradictions in CSI: Crime Scene Investigation Through Textual Analysis’, Journal of e-Media Studies, 2:1, npn.

 

·         Ley, Barbara L., Natalie Jankowski and Paul R. Brewer (2012) ‘Investigating CSI: Portrayals of DNA Testing on a Forensic Crime Show and their Potential Effects’, Public Understanding of Science, 21:1, pp.51-67.

 

·         Huey, Laura (2010) ‘”I’ve seen this on CSI”: Criminal Investigator’s Perceptions about the Management of Public Expectations in the Field’, Crime Media Culture, 6:1, pp.49-68.

 

·         Wilken, Rowan (2011) ‘Fantasies of Control: Numb3ers, Scientific Rationalism and the Management of Everyday Security Risks, Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies, 25:2, pp.201-11.

 

·         Byers, Michele & Val Marie Johnson (eds.) (2009)The CSI Effect: Television, Crime and Governance, Plymouth: Lexington.

 

·         Stevens, Dennis J. (2011) Media and Criminal Justice: The CSI Effect, London: Jones and Bartlett.

 

·         Podlas, Kimberlianne (2006) ‘The CSI Effect and Other Forensic Fictions’, Loyola of Los Angeles Entertainment Law Review, 27:2, pp.87-125.

 

·         Sankar, Pamela (2010) ‘Forensic DNA Phenotyping: Reinforcing Race in Law Enforcement’, in I. Whitmarsh & D. S. Jones (eds.) What’s the Use of Race? Modern Governance and the Biology of Difference, Minneapolis: MIT Press, pp.49-62.

 

·         Schweitzer, N. J. & Michael J. Saks (2007) ‘The CSI Effect: Popular Fiction About Forensic Science Affects the Public’s Expectations About Real Forensic Science’, Jurimetrics, vol. 47, pp.357-364.

 

 

 

Policies and Procedures

Macquarie University policies and procedures are accessible from Policy Central. Students should be aware of the following policies in particular with regard to Learning and Teaching:

Academic Honesty Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/academic_honesty/policy.html

Assessment Policy  http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/assessment/policy.html

Grade Appeal Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/gradeappeal/policy.html

Special Consideration Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/special_consideration/policy.html

In addition, a number of other policies can be found in the Learning and Teaching Category of Policy Central.

Student Support

Macquarie University provides a range of Academic Student Support Services. Details of these services can be accessed at: http://students.mq.edu.au/support/.

UniWISE provides:

  • Online learning resources and academic skills workshops http://www.mq.edu.au/learning_skills/
  • Personal assistance with your learning & study related questions.
  • The Learning Help Desk is located in the Library foyer (level 2).
  • Online and on-campus orientation events run by Mentors@Macquarie.

Student Services and Support

Students with a disability are encouraged to contact the Disability Support Unit who can provide appropriate help with any issues that arise during their studies.

Student Enquiries

Details of these services can be accessed at http://www.student.mq.edu.au/ses/.

IT Help

If you wish to receive IT help, we would be glad to assist you at http://informatics.mq.edu.au/help/

When using the university's IT, you must adhere to the Acceptable Use Policy. The policy applies to all who connect to the MQ network including students and it outlines what can be done.

Graduate Capabilities

Discipline Specific Knowledge and Skills

Our graduates will take with them the intellectual development, depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content in their chosen fields to make them competent and confident in their subject or profession. They will be able to demonstrate, where relevant, professional technical competence and meet professional standards. They will be able to articulate the structure of knowledge of their discipline, be able to adapt discipline-specific knowledge to novel situations, and be able to contribute from their discipline to inter-disciplinary solutions to problems.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • A clear understanding of shifting criminological constructions of the figure of the criminal.
  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A knowledge of, and capacity to effectively use, online archival resources
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.

Assessment tasks

  • Tutorial participation
  • Reseach exercise
  • Essay
  • Research project plan
  • Research Project

Critical, Analytical and Integrative Thinking

We want our graduates to be capable of reasoning, questioning and analysing, and to integrate and synthesise learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments; to be able to critique constraints, assumptions and limitations; to be able to think independently and systemically in relation to scholarly activity, in the workplace, and in the world. We want them to have a level of scientific and information technology literacy.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.

Assessment tasks

  • Tutorial participation
  • Essay
  • Research project plan
  • Research Project

Problem Solving and Research Capability

Our graduates should be capable of researching; of analysing, and interpreting and assessing data and information in various forms; of drawing connections across fields of knowledge; and they should be able to relate their knowledge to complex situations at work or in the world, in order to diagnose and solve problems. We want them to have the confidence to take the initiative in doing so, within an awareness of their own limitations.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcome

  • A knowledge of, and capacity to effectively use, online archival resources

Assessment tasks

  • Reseach exercise
  • Essay
  • Research Project

Creative and Innovative

Our graduates will also be capable of creative thinking and of creating knowledge. They will be imaginative and open to experience and capable of innovation at work and in the community. We want them to be engaged in applying their critical, creative thinking.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Assessment task

  • Research Project

Effective Communication

We want to develop in our students the ability to communicate and convey their views in forms effective with different audiences. We want our graduates to take with them the capability to read, listen, question, gather and evaluate information resources in a variety of formats, assess, write clearly, speak effectively, and to use visual communication and communication technologies as appropriate.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcome

  • A capacity to particpate effectively in debates about crime and criminality.

Assessment tasks

  • Tutorial participation
  • Research project plan

Engaged and Ethical Local and Global citizens

As local citizens our graduates will be aware of indigenous perspectives and of the nation's historical context. They will be engaged with the challenges of contemporary society and with knowledge and ideas. We want our graduates to have respect for diversity, to be open-minded, sensitive to others and inclusive, and to be open to other cultures and perspectives: they should have a level of cultural literacy. Our graduates should be aware of disadvantage and social justice, and be willing to participate to help create a wiser and better society.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.
  • A capacity to particpate effectively in debates about crime and criminality.

Assessment tasks

  • Tutorial participation
  • Essay
  • Research Project

Socially and Environmentally Active and Responsible

We want our graduates to be aware of and have respect for self and others; to be able to work with others as a leader and a team player; to have a sense of connectedness with others and country; and to have a sense of mutual obligation. Our graduates should be informed and active participants in moving society towards sustainability.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • A practical knowledge of key methods of critical analysis
  • A theoretically-informed understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and embodied subjectivity and sociality.
  • A capacity to particpate effectively in debates about crime and criminality.

Assessment tasks

  • Essay
  • Research Project