Search results for ""author david polizzi""

This book is a timely re-introduction to the work and life of one of criminology’s most respected theorists, Jack Katz, exploring the current relevance of this important author and highlighting his work to a broad audience. The scholarship of Jack Katz, as evidenced in his seminal Seductions of Crime and otherwise, has over the past three decades offered an alternative philosophical perspective to the study of crime and criminal behavior that is not defined by quantitative method or approach. Katz has radically altered the focus and range of contemporary criminology in a way that few if any other scholars have done and his work been foundational in the development of cultural criminology, itself now a high-profile alternative criminological perspective. Through a diverse range of chapters from recognized authors in the field – including a major new interview with Jack Katz himself, in which he describes the development of his ideas, work, and growth as a researcher – contributions take up aspects of his work from a variety of perspectives and discuss and expand its contemporary relevance to the discipline of criminology. This book will appeal to postgraduate students and scholars in the areas of criminology, cultural criminology, critical criminology, phenomenology, and sociology.

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Why is solitary confinement used in today’s world? Does it help the rehabilitation of offenders? And how is policy affected by justification for the use of it? This book is the first to consider the history of solitary confinement and how it is experienced by the individuals undergoing it. Using Merleau-Ponty’s concept of embodied subjectivity, it provides first-hand accounts of the inhumane experience of solitary confinement to provide a better appreciation of the relationship between penal strategy and its effect on human beings. Drawing on his own experiences as a Psychological Specialist in the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections and on those interviewed as part of the Guardian 6x9 project (http://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2016/apr/27/6x9-a-virtual-experience-of-solitary-confinement), the author focuses on the phenomenology of solitary confinement to consider what the intentional aspect of this almost uninhabitable type of confinement says about a democratic society that continues to justify its use as a correctional strategy. Aiming to influence policy, the book fills the gap between the practice of solitary confinement and its implications, as well as the social attitudes that uncritically condone its use.

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This book examines various aspects of the work of Bruce Arrigo related to therapeutic jurisprudence, criminal justice ethics, and the place of critical theory in criminology and related fields. Arrigo’s work spans over thirty years and during that time has been an important voice in the practical and theoretical application of post-modern and critical theoretical approaches to mental illness, the practice of forensic psychology, and a wide variety of critical reflection concerning incarceration, rehabilitation, and the ethical practice within the criminal justice system. Each individual contributor offers their own perspective on his work and its specific influence on the topic under discussion. This book speaks to academics focused on the application of critical criminological theory within a variety of disciplinary contexts. These include forensic psychology, psychological jurisprudence, criminal justice ethics, and philosophically based critiques of the law and mental health and criminal justice activism.

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It is well known that the social definition of individuals and ethnic groups helps legitimize how they are addressed by law enforcement. The philosophy of the social construction of crime and criminal behaviour reflects how individuals, such as police officers, construct meaning from the perspective from which they emerge, which in turn influences their law enforcement outlook. In the field, this is generally viewed through a positivist frame of reference which fails to critically examine assumptions of approach and practice. Written by an international specialist in this area, this is the first book which attempts to situate the social construction of crime and criminal behaviour within the philosophical context of phenomenology and how these constructions help inform, and ultimately justify, the policies employed to address them. Challenging existing thinking, this is essential reading for academics and students interested in social theory and theories of criminology.

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