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This module examines crime and criminal law in its broader cultural and historical context. It focuses on the strategies and techniques that lawyers, judges and commentators use to persuade others to their viewpoint, and that give us the fascinating stories, characters and ideas that make up criminal law. We look at the way that these stories and characters have been derived from outside of law: from fiction, drama and art, and which have in turn guided the development of our laws and key legal judgments. The module involves discussion of certain offences, e.g. murder, manslaughter, piracy, rape, as well as important broader issues, e.g. criminal justice as a spectacle (what does modern justice owe to visual art and theatrical performance?); 'hot' and 'cold'- blooded killing (what is the moral and legal distinction?); justice and revenge (what's the difference?); the role of metaphors such as the 'scales of justice' (what does criminal justice owe to ancient practices of trade and commerce?).

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Crime detection is prolific on television; a topic discussed across news and current affairs programming, documentaries, reality TV and, not the least, numerous crime dramas. This module examines different type of crime investigation narratives on television, providing you with tools for analysing the dynamic and contested cultural roles of crime TV. We will engage with diverse theoretical approaches to the relationship between crime detection and television, enabling your active participation in both popular and academic debates on this topic. In order to unpick the diverse cultural meanings that saturate and circulate different programmes, we will study their wider socio-historical contexts as well as cultural reception. Doing so, we pay particular attention to the specific aesthetic forms, narrative structures, figures, settings and themes that characterises televisual portrayals of different crime investigation practices, but we also consider genre linkages to literature, radio, cinema, and digital culture. Approaching the study of crime TV from the unique perspectives of film and television studies, this module will also highlight television’s contributions to the wider discursive construction of moving-image creation as a key technology of detection in modern culture.

Crime detection is prolific on television; a topic discussed across news and current affairs programming, documentaries, reality TV and, not the least, numerous crime dramas. This module examines different type of crime investigation narratives on television, providing you with tools for analysing the dynamic and contested cultural roles of crime TV. We will engage with diverse theoretical approaches to the relationship between crime detection and television, enabling your active participation in both popular and academic debates on this topic. In order to unpick the diverse cultural meanings that saturate and circulate different programmes, we will study their wider socio-historical contexts as well as cultural reception. Doing so, we pay particular attention to the specific aesthetic forms, narrative structures, figures, settings and themes that characterises televisual portrayals of different crime investigation practices, but we also consider genre linkages to literature, radio, cinema, and digital culture. Approaching the study of crime TV from the unique perspectives of film and television studies, this module will also highlight television’s contributions to the wider discursive construction of moving-image creation as a key technology of detection in modern culture.

What is the purpose of the criminal justice system?

What is the appropriate role of the police?

How have efforts to rehabilitate offenders changed over recent decades?

How are political priorities re-shaping criminal justice?

These are some of the questions that are central to 'Criminal Justice'. This module explores the policy and practice of key criminal justice institutions, including the police, probation and prisons. It will consider the duties and activities of these institutions, and the challenges that they face in an era of rapid change. The module will do so in light of key theoretical debates regarding the purpose and nature of criminal justice.

In summary, this module will enable students to explore the roles and historical trajectory of key criminal justice institutions and to critically analyse their appropriate future direction. Teaching is informed by relevant academic staff's published and ongoing research.

What is the purpose of the criminal justice system?

What is the appropriate role of the police?

How have efforts to rehabilitate offenders changed over recent decades?

How are political priorities re-shaping criminal justice?

These are some of the questions that are central to 'Criminal Justice'. This module explores the policy and practice of key criminal justice institutions, including the police, probation and prisons. It will consider the duties and activities of these institutions, and the challenges that they face in an era of rapid change. The module will do so in light of key theoretical debates regarding the purpose and nature of criminal justice.

In summary, this module will enable students to explore the roles and historical trajectory of key criminal justice institutions and to critically analyse their appropriate future direction. Teaching is informed by relevant academic staff's published and ongoing research.

This module provides an introduction to the substantive criminal law, and to fundamental aspects of criminal law in its broader criminal justice and societal context. It will examine the use of criminal law, and its associated processes, as a mode of governing individual and social conduct. It will provide: a critical introduction to principles and practices of criminalisation; a critical introduction to the doctrinal 'building blocks' of criminal liability and responsibility, and the opportunity to apply these "building block" principles, as well as the contextual material, to selected case studies.

It also focuses on providing a foundation in the key LLB Programme and QA Law Benchmark skills learning outcomes of: 'developing an ability to produce a synthesis of relevant doctrinal and policy issues, presentation of a reasoned choice between alternative solutions and critical judgement of the merits of particular arguments.'; and 'developing the ability to apply knowledge and understanding to offer evidenced conclusions, addressing complex actual or hypothetical problems.'