SOC 222 Crime, Media and Public Opinion

3 hours 

The course explores the nature of public understandings of social problems and solutions, particularly related to crime and justice, and the media's role in facilitating those understandings. The media provide audiences a distorted view of crime and punishment as well as the cognitive tools to think about crime and what should be done about it. The first aim of the course is to examine international, interdisciplinary scholarship from a range of empirical and theoretical perspectives that address the relationship between crime, media and public opinion in an evolving media landscape. The second aim is to challenge students to think critically, both about the course materials and about the messages they encounter through the media, and to consider innovative ways to improve the interplay between crime, media and criminal justice policy.