The Evolution of PRISONS: THE AMERICAN WAY OF PUNISHMENT:
1896: Statistics. Professor Wells. Lectures upon Charities. A brief study of crime. Forty exercises, four hours weekly. (Mayo-Smith’s Statistics and Sociology. Wines’ Punishment and Reformation.)
1911: Poverty and Crime. Professor Woods. This course investigates the causes of poverty, both individual and social, and the means for its prevention and relief. Social insurance and the theory of social reform are considered. A careful study is made of the causes of crime, the classes of criminals, and the purpose and method of their restraint.
1916: Poverty and Crime. Assistant Professor Woods. The causes and conditions of poverty and crime together with various proposed remedies and preventive measures.
1920: Poverty and Crime. Professor Woods. An examination of the problems of poverty and crime with special reference to the part played by heredity and by economic production and distribution.
1926: Criminology. Professor Holben. The course includes the analysis of the nature of crime, its organic and environmental causes, and the possibility of its preventions through the control of these causes, together with an examination of criminal procedure and of the principles and methods of punishment. This course will prove useful to men who expect to take up the study of law.
1946: Criminology. Professor Holben. This course deals with the problem of crime and the criminal in our American civilization. An analysis is made of the interplay of forces, within and without the criminal, which result in criminal behavior. Case studies illustrating the individual and social forces in crime careers are read. The sociology of American crime is emphasized, the special reference to the organized crime as a social phenomenon of American life. Careful study is made to the present administration of American criminal justice and of modern developments in penology, prison life, and the treatment of criminals in American prisons. The course concludes with a review of modern programs of crime prevention.
2018: Prisons: The American Way of Punishment. Professor King. Prison as a place of confinement, punishment and rehabilitation is the focus of this survey of the history, philosophies, structure and operation of corrections in the U. S. The course critically examines the concept of prison as a total institution and its panopticism as a model of social control that extends to other social contexts. The course will explore the world of inmates and their strategies of subcultural adaptations to and resistance against incarceration; as well as the role of the prison staff. Particular attention will be paid to how gender, race, economics and politics structure prison policies and dynamics. Specific topics may include cultural representations of prison life, implications of current sentencing practices, privatization and the prison-industrial complex, incarcerated mothers, capital punishment, juvenile justice, and alternatives to incarceration.