Browse Hierarchy HIST5007: Crime and Punishment through the Ages

The module looks at the nature of crime during the early modern period, and the way in which the criminal justice system and those in authority reacted to its incidence. The module will give special attention to issues such as gendered criminality, the obsession with the control of property crime and the contrasting legal contexts in existence throughout the British Isles. It will also focus on the history of violence and the history of attempts to regulate the morality of society. It will trace the history of law enforcement and of punishment, including the move from execution and corporal punishments to communal confinement, together with the socio-legal and philosophical rationales which lay behind this transformation. The module builds on the practical and theoretical work done in the level four modules Early Modern World, The Age of Revolution and Popular Protest, The Rise of the Modern World, Medicine and Society and Everyday Life in Britain. It complements the level five module Jack the Ripper and the Victorian Underworld, and with it prepares you for the level six module Advanced Study in the History of Crime.