What is Historical Criminology?

Thinking Historically about Crime and Justice... "its about time"

Chair of the BSC Historical Criminology Network, David Churchill, recently asked 'What is Historical Criminology?' in the 2018 Summer issue of the BSC Newsletter.  

"The time seems right," he said, "to put ‘historical criminology’ on a surer footing – to outline what it might mean, and to explicate what it might do for our understanding of crime and justice." He resists straightforwardly "eliding ‘the historical’ with ‘study of the past’" and instead asks us to "consider historical criminology as a mode of enquiry – an approach rather than a specialism, a disposition rather than a sub-discipline."

What do you think? Should Historical Criminology be defined by the methods employed? By the empirical approach adopted? Or by the theoretical framework applied? Comments are welcome but moderated to prevent spam. Click here for the full article (PDF).

'Back in Time for February' by NikkValentine via Flickr.com CC BY 2.0