African American Criminological Thought

Examines African American contributions, both historical and contemporary, to criminological thought.

This book argues that a theory of crime specific to the African American experience is justified by qualitative and quantitative data, not just because of the disproportionately higher percentage of African Americans (in the U.S. population) who are offenders, but also because of the vastly higher percentage of Black Americans who are non-offenders.

"This collection of writings is crucially important, in part, because it reminds us the theoretical paradigms of these and other African American scholars are excluded when crime, its causes, and its control are discussed by criminologists, criminal justice practitioners, and policy makers. To understand crime fully, the perspectives advanced by these scholars must become an integral part of discussions about who is a criminal and which public policies will best control crime." --From the forward by Anne Thomas Sulton, Ph.D, J.D. From W.E.B. Dubois through Lee Brown, this anthology provides a collection of the key articles in criminology and criminal justice written by black scholars. Available in a single volume for the first time, the articles collected in this book reflect the voices of African-American scholars and display the diversity of perspectives sought after in today's academic community. Crime in the African-American community is examined from social, economic and political perspectives, and the historical context of each article is provided by the editors. Spanning the 20th century, these works present a historical chronology of African-American views on crime and its control with theoretical perspectives that have often been tangential to mainstream scholarship. For your courses in: Criminological Theory Race and Crime Crime and Social Policy Minorities and Criminal Justice

In light of the Black Lives Matter movement and protests in many cities, race plays an ever more salient role in crime and justice. Within theoretical criminology, however, race has oddly remained on the periphery. It is often introduced as a control variable in tests of theories and is rarely incorporated as a central construct in mainstream paradigms (e.g., control, social learning, and strain theories). When race is discussed, the standard approach is to embrace the racial invariance thesis, which argues that any racial differences in crime are due to African Americans being exposed to the same criminogenic risk factors as are Whites, just more of them. An alternative perspective has emerged that seeks to identify the unique, racially specific conditions that only Blacks experience. Within the United States, these conditions are rooted in the historical racial oppression experienced by African Americans, whose contemporary legacy includes concentrated disadvantage in segregated communities, racial socialization by parents, experiences with and perceptions of racial discrimination, and disproportionate involvement in and unjust treatment by the criminal justice system. Importantly, racial invariance and race specificity are not mutually exclusive perspectives. Evidence exists that Blacks and Whites commit crimes for both the same reasons (invariance) and for different reasons (race-specific). A full understanding of race and crime thus must involve demarcating both the general and specific causes of crime, the latter embedded in what it means to be "Black" in the United States. This volume seeks to explore these theoretical issues in a depth and breadth that is not common under one cover. Again, given the salience of race and crime, this volume should be of interest to a wide range of criminologists and have the potential to be used in graduate seminars and upper-level undergraduate courses.

Ideal for use in either crime theory or race and crime courses, this is the only text to look at the array of explanations for crime as they relate to racial and ethnic populations. Each chapter begins with a historical review of each theoretical perspective and how its original formulation and more recent derivatives account for racial/ethnic differences. The theoretical perspectives include those based on religion, biology, social disorganization/strain, subculture, labeling, conflict, social control, colonial, and feminism. The author considers which perspectives have shown the most promise in the area of race/ethnicity and crime.

To this date, efforts to document the scholarly contributions of exclusively African American criminologists are nonexistent. This is a reference work which offers contemporary Afrocentric perspective on critical issues of crime and justice by focusing on the contributions of African American criminologists whose interests and responses to crime arguably differ from those of mainstream white criminologists. This reference will be of interest to undergraduate and graduate students and faculty in criminal justice and practitioners in policy making. Most of the abstracts can be cross-referenced to publications within mainstream criminal justice journals. In addition, selected books, manuscripts, and an array of state and government documents are included and provide rare Afrocentric perspectives on issues of crime and justice. In the process, it credits many Caucasians and ethnic minorities as important contributors to a given publication. This reference book consists of five chapters: (1) an introductory article on issues that define (and confront) African American criminologists, (2) an alphabetical listing of published abstracts for each contributing author, (3) selected references to each publication, (4) an appendix containing titles to doctoral dissertations for all contributing African American scholars, and (5) an author and subject index.

Past studies have suggested that offenders desist from crime due to a range of factors, such as familial pressures, faith based interventions or financial incentives. To date, little has been written about the relationship between desistance and racialisation. This book seeks to bring much needed attention to this under-researched area of criminological inquiry. Martin Glynn builds on recent empirical research in the UK and the USA and uses Critical Race Theory as a framework for developing a fresh perspective about black men’s desistance. This book posits that the voices and collective narrative of black men offers a unique opportunity to refine current understandings of desistance. It also demonstrates how new insights can be gained by studying the ways in which elements of the desistance trajectory are racialised. This book will be of interest both to criminologists and sociologists engaged with race, racialisation, ethnicity, and criminal justice.

"The organization of the reader's guide—especially the groupings of landmark cases, race riots, and criminology theories—is impressive ... Other related titles lack the breadth, detail, and accessibility of this work ... Recommended for all libraries; essential for comprehensive social studies collections." —Library Journal As seen almost daily on local and national news, race historically and presently figures prominently in crime and justice reporting within the United States, in the areas of hate crimes, racial profiling, sentencing disparities, wrongful convictions, felon disenfranchisement, political prisoners, juveniles and the death penalty, and culturally specific delinquency prevention programs. The Encyclopedia of Race and Crime covers issues in both historical and contemporary context, with information on race and ethnicity and their impact on crime and the administration of justice. These two volumes offer a greater appreciation for the similar historical experiences of varied racial and ethnic groups and illustrate how race and ethnicity has mattered and continues to matter in the administration of American criminal justice. Key Features Covers a number of broad thematic areas: basic concepts and theories of criminal justice; the police, courts, and corrections; juvenile justice; public policy; the media; organizations; specific groups and populations; and specific cases and biographies Addresses such topics as gender, hate/bias crimes, immigrant experiences, international and cross-cultural issues, race and gangs, and race and law, Presents experiences of all major racial and ethnic groups in the U.S., including Asians, Blacks, Latinos, Native Americans, and Ethnic Whites, as well as religious minorities, such as Muslims Includes coverage of recent incidents like the alleged rape of a black female North Carolina Central University student by white male members of the Duke University Lacrosse Team;, the Jena 6 incident; the Tulia, Texas drug arrests; the Rodney King beating; the O. J. Simpson trials in the 1990s; and more recent racial profiling incidents Two appendices provide information on locating and interpreting statistical data on race and crime, as well as detailed instructions on how to access statistical data on the web for such specific areas as arrests, drugs, gang membership, hate crimes, homicide trends, juvenile justice, prison populations, racial profiling, the death penalty, and victimization Because the topic of race and crime is of wide interest and relevance, entries in this Encyclopedia are written in an accessible style to appeal to a broad audience, making it a welcome addition to academic and public libraries alike.