Crime, Control and Culture
Broadening the analysis of crime and crime control
Crime, Control and Culture is a research group based at the Department of Sociology at Lund University, aiming at broadening the study of crime and crime control.
The group draws on a variety of social science methods and theories to explore the human and non-human agents involved in crime and crime control, as well as the wider social, cultural and technological structures in which these agents are embedded.
Questions explored in the group include:
- What constitutes a crime?
- How do people involved in crime experience and explain their own actions?
- How do victims experience and make sense of the crimes they have suffered?
- How do police officers and other agents of control operate beyond laws and regulations?
- How do new technologies, political debates and media coverage influence the way crime is undertaken and controlled?
These are but a few of the questions discussed in the research group’s on-going seminars and publications.
The group has a firm footing in qualitative methods, especially ethnography, but also draws on quantitative methods to ensure in-depth, cross-disciplinary coverage of the topics explored. Most members of Crime, Control and Culture are sociologists, anthropologists and criminologists from Lund University, but experts from other disciplines and parts of the world are also listed among its members.
Contact
If you want to hear more about the work of Crime, Control and Culture, or if you wish to join the group, please contact the coordinators Sébastien Tutenges (sebastien [dot] tutenges [at] soc [dot] lu [dot] se) or David Sausdal (david [dot] sausdal [at] soc [dot] lu [dot] se).
Some of the group's ongoing research projects
Graffiti writer’s stories, youths in institutions, prisoners, violent gang members, women engaged in drug dealing, how young criminals talk about violence, violence-promoting Islamic extremism, Muslims in Norway involved in street life and crime, stories told by war victims, social control efforts, digital crowdsourcing in civilian reconnaissance, the traditional police, the boundary between a gift and a bribe, mediation between criminals and their victims, sousveillance and citizen journalism, emotion management in the Swedish courtroom, crime victims, the treatment of men who have abused their female partner, violence among siblings, stories on being harassed by the police told by young people with an immigrant background, ways to measure fear of crime.
Read a short summery of the projects with links to learn more.
"Crime, Control and Culture" has replaced the research environment "Sociological Criminology".
Researchers in the group
Many colleagues from the Department of Sociology are active in this group, but there are also many members from other universities, faculties and departments. See the full list here.