This unit draws upon a wide array of primary and secondary sources in order to provide a critical assessment of how crime was perceived, controlled and punished in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It has three main aims—firstly, to examine changes in crime and perceptions of crime over this period; secondly, to investigate the manner in which law enforcement and criminal justice systems were reformed in response to changing needs and perceptions; and thirdly, to critically assess the competing theoretical frameworks which have been advanced to explain reform. Key questions to be addressed include—What was the rationale behind Witchcraft? What did contemporaries regard... -- Course Website
Instructor: Dr David Barrie
Prerequisites: any Level 2 unit in History or MEMS2002 World Views: Religion, Gender and Society in Pre-modern Europe