2023-2024 Course Catalog
Welcome to Virginia Tech! We are excited that you are here planning your time as a Hokie.
Welcome to Virginia Tech! We are excited that you are here planning your time as a Hokie.
Analyzes changing understandings of crime and punishment from the Colonial Era to the Age of Mass Incarceration. Considers how factors of race, ethnicity, class, and gender intersected with changing ideas of criminality and punishments.
Considers how the definition of murder as a crime has changed from the colonial period to the present day. Uses murder cases to study the dynamics of American society in condemning, condoning, or celebrating murder. Asks how cultural factors, including racial prejudice, gender stereotypes, beliefs about sexuality, and class status affected the act of killing, media coverage of the event, societal reactions, and the execution of justice. Topics covered include abortion, lynching, vigilante justice, and the evolution of the legal system.
Principles of criminology and contemporary theories of criminal behavior, focusing on the extent and distribution of crime in the United States.
Analyzes the systems of justice in the United States, from a sociological perspective. Focuses on law enforcement, courts, and corrections. Evaluates the effectiveness of social policies related to systems of justice. Explores the structural, community, and individual level factors that influence different stages of justice systems.
Focuses on women as victims and perpetrators of crime, with particular attention to race and class. Analyzes how social, cultural, and economic factors influence victimization and participation in crime. Includes adolescent girls involvement with crime, including juvenile gangs. Evaluates theoretical explanations of why women commit crime. Examines womens experiences with the criminal justice system.
Examination of juvenile delinquency. Includes methods of data collection and the extent and distribution of delinquency. Detailed coverage of theories of delinquent behavior. Examines the juvenile justice system and treatment and prevention of delinquency. Utilizes current empirical research on delinquency in the U.S. and internationally.
A variable topics course in criminology. In-depth examination of topics such as capital punishment, women and criminology, racial profiling, terrorism, white collar crime, law enforcement, international gangs, political crime, the prison system, cybercrime, and rape. May be repeated 2 times with different content for a maximum of 9 credits. Junior standing.
Empirical patterns and consequences of cybercrimes. Emphasis on applying criminological theories of crime and victimization to cyberspace. Cybercrime prevention strategies and tactics. Examination of ethical issues of privacy, security, and social control. Pre: Junior standing.
Focuses on the causes, manifestations, and consequences of hate crimes in the United States. Includes theories of prejudice and biased behavior, the context of perpetration, the individual and community-level effects on the victims, and the political, historical, and social significance of such crimes. Considers broad questions of bias compared to hate, the recognition and prosecution of hate crimes compared to non-bias crimes, the impacts of hate crimes at the individual and community levels, and responses by law enforcement and communities.
Focuses on the ways in which involvement in the criminal justice system affects families and family systems. Analyzes the antecedents and consequences of parental incarceration, including an investigation as to how social policies influence this phenomenon. Includes how offenders and their families are embedded in the criminal justice system and learn to navigate periods of incarceration and reentry—which includes family members’ secondary prisonization. Examines the emotional and financial costs of incarceration and reentry on families, as families serve as informal safety nets.
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