I. General Information

1. Course Title:
Criminology

2. Course Prefix & Number:
SOCL 2405

3. Course Credits and Contact Hours:

Credits: 3

Lecture Hours: 3

Lab Hours: 0

4. Course Description:

Students will study the nature and origins of crime, past and present theories of crime, the social construction of criminality, the social costs of incarceration, and cross-cultural strategies for addressing crime issues and decriminalization of consensual crimes.

5. Placement Tests Required:

Accuplacer (specify test):

Reading College Level CLC or Reading College Level

Score:

6. Prerequisite Courses:

There are no prerequisites for this course.

9. Co-requisite Courses:

There are no corequisites for this course.

II. Transfer and Articulation

1. Course Equivalency - similar course from other regional institutions:

Name of Institution	Course Number and Title	Credits
St. Cloud Technical and Community College	SOC 367	3
Mankato State University	SOC 442	3

III. Course Purpose

2. MN Transfer Curriculum (General Education) Courses - This course fulfills the following goal area(s) of the MN Transfer Curriculum:
Goal 5 – History and the Social and Behavioral Sciences

IV. Learning Outcomes

1. College-Wide Outcomes

College-Wide Outcomes/Competencies	Students will be able to:
Demonstrate reading and listening skills	Students will read assigned materials in textbooks
Apply abstract ideas to concrete situations	Students will debate relevant issues in class
Discuss/compare characteristics of diverse cultures and environments	Students will apply sociological concepts to help understand themselves and the world around them.

2. Course Specific Outcomes - Students will be able to achieve the following measurable goals upon completion of the course:

• Articulate the processes by which social forces affect individuals through organizations or institutions, and vice versa (MnTC Goal 5);
• Apply founding theoretical traditions and concepts in criminology to specific organizations or institutions (MnTC Goal 5);
• Explain how social structure affects human action and social life at the micro, meso, and macro levels (MnTC Goal 5);
• Articulate the processes through which groups, formal organizations, and social networks influence human thought and action (MnTC Goal 5);
• Explain how hierarchy, power and authority operate across the criminal justice system (MnTC Goal 5);
• Explain the relationship between the self and society (MnTC Goal 5); 
• Articulate how the self is socially constructed, maintained and transformed at multiple levels through specific organizations or institutions (MnTC Goal 5); 
• Identify how race, ethnicity, social-class, sex and gender shape the social construction of what it means to be a criminal (MnTC Goal 5); and
• Examine crime through social, legal, political, religious, and economic institutions and across a range of historical periods and cultures (MnTC Goal 5).

V. Topical Outline

Listed below are major areas of content typically covered in this course.

1. Lecture Sessions

1. Social System Orientation
• Self-report survey of criminal behavior of this class (before biases set in)
• Cultural influences on crime
• Nature vs. nurture and criminal behavior
2. The History of Punishment
• The Inquisition
• U.S. incarceration rates today
3. Criminology Emerges as a Discipline
• The Dark Ages
• Classical-rational
• Positivist
4. Early Criminologists
• Durkheim and Quetelet
• Biological Theories:  Lombroso, Sheldon, Eugenics
• Rational Choice
• Mental retardation, mental illness and xrime
5. Structural Theories
• Shaw and McKay, Durkheim’s Anomie, Merton’s Typology
• Microcase statistical correlation of social variables and crime
• Specialization, the division of labor, weak social ties in modern life
6. Social Process Theory
• Differential Association Theory
• Social Bonding/Control Theory
• Linking structural and process theories
7. Deviance as a Social Construction of Reality
• Labeling Theory
8. Consensual Crimes
• Drug use
• Prostitution
• Prohibition as a test case
9. White Collar Crimes