Sociology and Criminology BA (Hons)

Core modules

Reconceptualising Sustainable Justice (20 credit points)

• You’ll outline and evaluate current approaches to justice.
• You’ll explore the opportunities and challenges around reconceptualising justice.
• You’ll reflect on the ethics and sustainability of different/developing ideas around justice.

Explaining Crime (20 credit points)

• You’ll assess the merits of competing theories relevant to crime, victimisation and responses to crime, together with the role of criminology in society.
• You’ll explore developments in criminological thought through the lens of disciplines such as sociology, psychology, and criminology.

Constructing Modern Societies (20 credit points)

• You’ll further develop your understanding of the modern world by applying contemporary social theory.
• You’ll adopt a decolonial approach to knowledge through the introduction to global sociological perspectives.
• You’ll apply reflexivity and critical awareness skills in the real world by integrating sociological thought and practice.

Sociology and Service Learning (20 credit points)

• You’ll work with social and civic organisations seeking to make a difference in a wide range of contemporary social issues.
• You’ll apply your sociological thinking to real-world issues and problems, working with practitioners, academics and community members as ‘public sociologists’.
• You’ll develop your ‘disciplinary identity’ as a public sociologist through the application of theory to practice contributing positively to a social justice issue.

Applied Social Research (20 credit points)

• You’ll develop your understanding of research in the Social Sciences and learn how research skills are applied in pursuit of social knowledge.
• There is a strong emphasis on application to provide an opportunity to highlight your research skills by developing a research portfolio.
• You’ll learn about research design, qualitative and quantitative methods, data analysis and appropriate presentation of research findings.

Optional modules

Gender, Sex and Sexuality (20 credit points)

• You’ll be introduced to the theoretical, political and cultural perspectives of gender, sex and sexuality.
• You’ll differentiate and evaluate a range of sociological approaches to understanding concepts of gender, sex and sexuality.
• You’ll identify and construct accounts of contemporary practices around, and representations of gender within a historical social context.

Sociology of Consumption (20 credit points)

• You’ll identify the social, cultural, political, and economic significance of consumption practices.
• You’ll consider and critique differing meanings of consumption and a variety of sociological and related theories that account for its significance.
• You’ll situate consumption practices within a broader analysis of capitalism, past and present, considering its social divisions and inequalities.

The Body in Society (20 credit points)

• You’ll explore how aspects of the human body relate to the social organisation of everyday life from a sociological perspective.
• You’ll consider the body in sociology through a focus on key theoretical perspectives relating to embodiment, and research addressing related issues.
• You’ll develop an understanding of the range of social and cultural factors that make the body more central to the contemporary self.

Sociology of Education (20 credit points)

• You’ll develop an understanding of the evolution of formal education, focusing particularly on policy developments designed to combat educational inequality.
• You’ll explore the sociological characteristics of lifelong learning and how these influence individual ‘learning careers’.
• You’ll reflect on your own ‘learning career’ as part of your ongoing career development.

Religion, Nonreligion and Everyday Belief (20 credit points)

• You’ll be introduced to some of the major discussions within the sociology of religion (e.g. concerning secularisation, individualisation and fundamentalism).
• You’ll consider contemporary debates concerning religion/spirituality (e.g. around issues of gender, sexuality, freedom of speech and violence).
• You’ll explore the role of religion/spirituality in the lives of believers and faith communities.

Politics and Social Justice (20 credit points)

• You’ll gain a critical understanding of how sociologists have studied political phenomena.
• You’ll examine a range of sociological approaches towards the state, society and power.
• You’ll engage political sociology in the analysis of contemporary politics, policy areas, and social justice.

Digital Culture and Society (20 credit points)

• You'll develop an understanding of contemporary sociological perspectives in which the impact of technologies is an integral focus.
• You’ll evaluate social transition in relation to technological developments.
• You’ll develop critical skills in evaluating and developing digital content.

Core modules

Theorising Contemporary Society (20 credit points)

• You’ll gain an understanding of contemporary sociological theory by demonstrating its usefulness in helping us to understand issues and social practices in contemporary society.
• You’ll critically reflect upon key concepts and emphases of contemporary sociological thought.
• You’ll identify both similarities and differences between issues in classical sociological theory and issues found in contemporary sociological theory.

Research Project (40 credit points)

• You’ll bring together your learning across your degree into a sustained piece of independent learning which can be delivered in the format of a dissertation or a research-based report for a local organisation.
• You’ll be supported with one-to-one supervision from a member of academic staff.
• You’ll develop analytical and presentation skills for future employability.

Sociology of Work and Career (20 credit points)

• You’ll make explicit sociological links between ‘work’ and ‘career’ – where the concept of ‘career’ will enable you to understand how work relates to other activities undertaken through the life course (e.g. volunteering, formal and informal learning, leisure.)
• You’ll apply career development theory as a means of understanding your personal experiences of ‘work’ and ‘career’.
• You’ll engage with formative and summative assessment opportunities that serve to facilitate your career and personal development.

Optional modules

Sociology of Harm (20 credit points)

• You’ll interrogate social harm as a lens through which to understand and explain injustices in contemporary society.
• You’ll take a broad sociological approach to (in)justice, moving beyond individualistic, legalistic, and traditional criminological explanations.
• You’ll develop a critical appreciation of crime, the possibility of agency and importantly new and emerging social justice insights.

Environmental Justice (20 credit points)

• You’ll cover a range of sociological theories which have come to underpin the developing area of environmental sociology, and explore how they help us understand and respond sustainably to major social and environmental challenges of today.
• You’ll adopt a reflexive sociological standpoint towards how environmental change can be explained and addressed.
• You’ll develop transferrable and applied knowledge and skills and apply these to address environmental justice in contemporary policy, social practices and institutions.

Race, Culture and Society (20 credit points)

• You’ll critically analyse the construction of ‘race’, racial identity and racism in a historical and contemporary context.
• You’ll use sociological perspectives to investigate the relationship between ‘race’, other social identities and contemporary social issues including decolonisation.
• You’ll explore the contestability of apparently fixed concepts like ‘race’ ethnicity, culture and identity in order to understand how ‘race’, racism and colonial logic feature in contemporary social policy.

Cities and Urban Life (20 credit points)

• You’ll examine a range of social, political, economic and cultural issues and theoretical perspectives within an urban context.
• You’ll gain an appreciation of global sociology, by integrating perspectives on urbanism and urbanization derived from beyond Europe and North America.
• You’ll critically reflect upon your own urban experience of living and/or studying in Nottingham.

Popular Culture (20 credit points)

• You’ll expand your understanding of the social and political, to questions of power which shape our everyday experiences and the cultural representations of the world in which we live.
• You’ll be provided with the theoretical resources to critically analyse a range of cultural texts, including screen and other media cultures, youth cultures, and fashion, as well as the everyday experience of the home, sites of consumption, sport and leisure.
• You’ll draw on a wide range of theoretical traditions and empirical case studies from around the world, including cinematic, TV and musical traditions.

Identities and Intimacies (20 credit points)

• You’ll develop your understanding of the construction and management of personal and social identities in contemporary western society, and globally through the lens of personal life.
• You'll explore sociological approaches to the study of intimacy, sex, and love and their relevance to contemporary discussions of well-being.
• You’ll analyse a variety of contemporary close and personal relationships (e.g. marriage, family, friendship, sexual partners) across cultures and traditions.

Media & Crime (20 credit points)

• This module will help you develop a critical understanding of theories that shape the connections between criminology and media studies.
• You’ll discover distinct approaches and representations of crime by mass and new media.
• You’ll explore current issues faced by the media, such as discussions about fake news and how the media approach criminal and antisocial behaviours.

Gender & Crime (20 credit points)

• You’ll explore the theoretical links between gender, crime, justice and the socio-historical context in which these theories emerged.
• You’ll critically assess classical and contemporary feminist criminological perspectives.
• You’ll critically evaluate the debates surrounding the differential treatment of women and men in the Criminal Justice System as victims, offenders and/or professionals.

Cultural Criminology (20 credit points)

• You’ll explore the limitations of existing orthodox explanations of crime, deviance and transgression.
• You’ll understand the relationship of cultural criminology within a broader criminological theoretical landscape.

Crime, Race & Empire (20 credit points)

• You’ll develop an understanding of the relationship between punishment and society in colonial contexts and a familiarity with non-westernised perspectives of justice and punishment.
• You’ll develop a critical awareness of historical resistance to punishment.
• You’ll critically apply post and decolonial critiques of crime and punishment.