An introduction to crime and criminology

Crime evokes a wide variety of reactions in people: fear, anger, fascination, excitement, curiosity. This course, An introduction to crime and criminology, considers the relatively common-place problem of vandalism in the form of graffiti as one examplethrough which to explore your own views about an everyday sort of crime. The course goes on to consider how social scientists and criminologists, in particular, study and seek to understand problems of crime. The course invites you to develop what can be called your 'criminological imagination'. This, in part, involves viewing criminological issues or problems from multiple perspectives but also encourages you to recognise that private troubles and social issues are often linked together. 

• Introduction
• Learning outcomes
• 1 Fear and fascination with crime and criminals
• 1 Fear and fascination with crime and criminals
• 1.1 Societies fearful of, yet fascinated by crime
• 1.2 What is crime?
• 1.3 Defining crime
• 2 Once a crime always a crime?
• 2 Once a crime always a crime?
• 2.1 Graffiti: crime or free expression?
• 2.2 Questioning what is a crime and what is not
• 3 What is criminology?
• 3 What is criminology?
• 3.1 What kinds of questions do criminologists seek to answer?
• 3.2 What do criminologists do?
• 3.3 Criminology at The Open University
• 3.4 Being open to multiple perspectives on problems of crime
• 4 What is the criminological imagination?
• 4 What is the criminological imagination?
• 4.1 Exploring your criminological imagination
• 5 Crime and criminology quiz
• 5 Crime and criminology quiz
• Conclusion
• References
• Further reading
• Acknowledgements