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Purpose – To propose a radically new way to understand the science of Cesare Lombroso, the first scientific criminologist, and thus to broaden understanding of the origins of criminology.

Approach – Using both comparative and analytical methods, we locate Lombroso's science of criminal anthropology in the context of late nineteenth-century Gothicism.

Findings – Lombroso's born criminals were Gothic creations, holdovers (like the crumbling castles of Gothic novels) from an earlier, less civilized period, human gargoyles (like the characters of Gothic romances) redolent of death and the uncanny. Moreover, Lombroso's Gothic science, with its depictions of physically and psychologically abnormal criminals, contributed to a transformation in social control by scientifically legitimating the social exclusion and intensified control of those perceived as morally monstrous.

Originality and value – This study creates a new framework for understanding Lombroso's contributions to criminological science and social control. Moreover, in a way that is almost unique in criminology, it combines historical research in literature and art with the history of science.

Research implications – To a degree not usually recognized, a science and its social control ramifications can be shaped by the artistic sensibilities and cultural traditions of the period in which it develops.

This chapter focuses on the early history of feminist explorations in criminology in the UK in particular, but with reference to developments elsewhere. The chapter discusses the achievements of early feminist perspectives in criminology and assesses their impact in terms of ‘transforming and transgressing’ the criminological enterprise. In particular, the author focuses on the case for transformations in traditional research methodologies and looks at the different ways in which feminist writers in criminology grappled with the question of how to produce good quality knowledge. The chapter takes a chronological approach, identifying developments pre-1960s in a phase which might be described as an ‘awakening’ and then describing initiatives in the 1960s and 1970s. The discovery that ‘woman’ was a conceptual term which could be incorporated into the criminological framework really took off in the 1970s with the publication of Carol Smart’s pioneering work. Notwithstanding faster developments in other disciplines, slowly, mainstream criminology took stock of feminism’s early claims.

Crime and social control present important issues that move and affect large segments of society. Whether we consider the impact of criminal events in terms of victimization, the construction of deviance into criminalized acts, or the many socially relevant aspects related to criminal justice policies and other social control activities, crime and justice are matters that deserve our most serious attention. It is largely for this reason that scholars develop astute theoretical models and sophisticated methodologies to study crime and social control in their many significant components. Yet, the world of popular culture, which we tend to associate with playfulness and fun, has also embraced themes related to crime and its control. It is perhaps a sign of the very earnestness associated with crime and social control that these themes are also dealt with in the social institutions of entertainment. The study of such portrayals of crime and criminal justice in popular culture is the focus of the present volume.

Purpose – This chapter explores the commercially successful and critically acclaimed motion picture The Dark Knight as a cultural artifact that both reflects and influences popular notions of crime and justice in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Design/methodology/approach – From a cultural criminological perspective, this chapter examines ideological messages pertaining to crime and justice presented in the film, including the framing of conflict as one between good and evil, justifications for extralegal violence, and reliance on absolute power as a means of social control. This chapter assesses reactions to the film as a “ritual moral exercise” in which viewers assuage their anxieties and insecurities in a post-9/11 world.

Findings – This chapter investigates representations of justice in the film, including the construction of the villain as “other,” the perception of constitutional procedures as impediments to justice, the embrace of vigilantism, and the willingness to sacrifice transparency of government authorities while accepting widespread surveillance in a time of crisis. Such themes resonated with some viewers who interpreted the film as offering explicit vindication for many of the questionable tactics used in the war on terror.

Originality/value – This chapter argues that popular media, specifically fictional entertainment media, play a role in reflecting and informing collective sentiments of justice. It offers an analysis of The Dark Knight as celebrating individualized, American-style retributive justice in a post-9/11 context.

Reference librarians in today's academic libraries are typically confronted with a growing array of simultaneous demands. Strained financial resources, staffing shortages, the challenge of adding new services, the explosion of information, and the electronic revolution have complicated (and sometimes compromised) the delivery of quality services. In response to many universities' growing commitment to offer nontraditional degree programs, reference staff are also assuming more responsibility for night and weekend instruction.

This chapter documents how the shift in psychiatric representation from the “morally insane” perpetrator of the 19th century to the modern psychopath or person with anti-social personality disorder involves a recasting of the offender from someone afflicted with an illness whose criminal misconduct is merely a symptom of their disorder to someone whose criminal misconduct is perceived as an expression of their true character. Drawing upon recent case law, the article then shows how prosecutors deploy this modern psychiatric reconfiguring during the penalty phase of the US capital trial to persuade jurors to decide in favor of death over life without parole. Central to the building of this narrative is the reframing of the offenders’ silences as well as what are taken as their unconvincing attempts to show remorse as evidence of a pathology whose primary manifestation is the incapacity to feel or experience moral emotions. Applying but also modifying Harold Garfinkel's work on degradation ceremonies, the chapter shows how the pathologizing of the offender's lack of remorse involves a rite of passage in which he or she is symbolically demoted from someone worthy of life in spite of their grievous crime to someone for whom death is the only appropriate penalty.

Purpose: This chapter illuminates the ways in which the coherent arrangements of prisons contribute to variation in implementation, functioning, and consequences of a purportedly gender neutral policy, the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA), between women’s and men’s prisons.

Methodology/Approach: Guided by grounded theory, two waves of qualitative interviews with inmates, staff, and volunteers at two Midwest women’s prisons were conducted for a total of 61 interviews. Interviews were supplemented with archival data obtained from state historical archives, news outlets, and the Iowa Department of Corrections, as well as participant observation of prisoner advocacy group meetings and the Iowa Board of Corrections’ meetings, and a content analysis of an online discussion forum for correctional officers.

Findings: We find that the gender subtext of prisons shapes the way the PREA is perceived and implemented. Overall, we argue that due to founding logics that differentially shaped the coherent arrangements of men’s and women’s prisons, blanket policies operate differently in these institutions. The gender subtext of prisons, specifically the structural arrangements and cultural processes within women’s and men’s prisons form different landscapes in which the PREA is perceived, enforced, and responded to.

Practical Implications: Given these findings, we call for gender-informed policy that takes gender subtext into account but that also avoids the trap of statistical discrimination present in some gender responsive policies.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how tattoos can be considered documents of an individual’s identity, experiences, status and actions in a given context, relating to ideas stating that archival records/documents can be of many types and have different functions. The paper also wants to discuss how tattoos serve as a bank of memories and evidence on a living body; in this respect, the tattooed body can be viewed as an archive, which immortalises and symbolises the events and relationships an individual has experienced in his or her life, and this in relation to a specific social and cultural context.

To discuss these issues, the authors take the point of departure in the tattoo practice of Russian/Soviet prisoners. The tattoo material referred to is from the “Russian Criminal Tattoo Archive”. The archive is created by FUEL Design and Publishing that holds the meanings of the tattoos as explained in Russian Criminal Tattoo Encyclopaedia Volume I-III. The authors exemplify this practice with two photographs of Soviet/Russian prisoners and their tattoos. By using a semiotic analysis that contextualises these images primarily through literature studies, the authors try to say something about what meaning these tattoos might carry.

The paper argues that it is possible to view the tattoo as a document, bound to an individual, reflecting his/her life and a given social and cultural context. As documents, they provide the individual with the essential evidence of his or her endeavours in a criminal environment. They also function as an individual’s memory of events and relationships (hardships and comradeships). Subsequently, the tattoos help create and sustain an identity. Finally, the tattoo presents itself as a document that may represent a critique of a dominant society or simply the voice of the alienated.

By showing how tattoos can be seen as documents and memory records, this paper brings a new kind of item into information and archival studies. It also uses theories and concepts from information and archival studies to put new light on the functions of tattoos.

Provides a glossary of some (around 150) English‐French and French‐English building and surveying terms. References the Technical help to Exporters service, and three specialist dictionaries dealing with architectural, real estate and building terms. Illustrates possible pitfalls of poor translation – ′hydraulic rams′ being translated in one firm′s technical literature as ′watery sheep.′