What Are Crime, Deviance And Social Control?

Spitting in the street, eating with your hands, marrying more than one person, dyeing your hair green: in one society these are perfectly normal, in another they are shocking, and in a third they will get you arrested. Sociologists draw a sharp line between breaking the law and simply breaking the unwritten rules of a group, and that line moves depending on where you are, who you are with and what year it is. This topic teaches you to think about rule-breaking the way an examiner wants: precisely, and without assuming your own culture sets the standard for everyone.

You will learn to define crime and deviance, to show how deviance is relative rather than fixed, and to map the agencies that keep us in line. Some are formal, with the power of the state behind them, such as the police and the courts. Others are informal and far more constant, such as a disapproving parent, a teacher's frown or a friend who stops messaging you. By the end you will be able to explain how a society holds itself together without most of us ever meeting a police officer.