Justice Studies Courses and Faculty
Associate Professor: Kathleen Cameron, Director
Assistant Professor: Roy F. Janisch
Descriptions of Courses
JUST 104. Introduction to the Justice System. 3 hours. Roles of law enforcement personnel, the courts, and correctional agencies. Philosophical and theoretical views in historical perspective.
JUST 109. Principles of Justice Studies. 3 hours. The nature of justice, how justice is linked to power, ideology, social control, social change. Generative themes in various dimensions of justice such as social and economic justice, gender, race and criminal justice.
JUST 223. Basic Interviewing and Counseling Skills. 3 hours. The role and purpose of accepted interviewing techniques and their application to counseling, interrogation, and other social situations.
JUST 322. Ethics and Justice Policy. 3 hours. Ethical theories and their application to principles of justice, law, and social policies.
JUST 328. Police and Justice. 3 hours. Objectives, strategies, programs, institutional arrangements, roles, perspectives, and interagency relationships of police.
SOSCI 387. Social Research Design. 4 hours. Designing and implementing sociological research, including translation of theory into Hypotheses, Operationalization of definitions, Questionnaire Construction, and testing, analysis, and presentation of findings. Prerequisite: SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology. May be taken for honors.
SOSCI 388. Social Research Analysis. 4 hours. Answering social research questions using quantitative and qualitative data. Techniques of data management and analysis using SPSS. Prerequisite: POLS 101 U.S. Politics or GEOG 106 World Regional Geography. For Sociology majors SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology and SOSCI 387 Social Research Design.
POLS 412. Law in Film and Literature. 3 hours. Philosophical inquiry into the nature of law and legal phenomena as elucidated by film and literature. Focus on constitutive legal theories, including natural law, legal realism, Marxist legal theory, and poststructuralism.
SOC 443. Race and Ethnic Relations. 3 hours. Comparative examination of racial and ethnic groups, with special attention given to the concept of race; the nature and causes of racial-ethnic inequalities; prejudice and discrimination, and racially motivated violence.
Prerequisite: SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology or permission of instructor. May be taken for honors.
POLS 450. Political Philosophy I. 3 hours. The nature of distributive, social and corrective justice. Natural law, natural rights, utilitarianism, Marxism and their contemporary counterparts. May be taken for honors.
JUST 475. Community Policing. 3 hours. The development of community and problem-solving policing. Emphasis is placed on the critical issues in community policing, especially the patterns of interaction between police and the public
JUST 480. Women, Crime, and Justice. 3 hours. A historical examination of social, economic, and legal factors that have defined violence against women, violence by women, and the role of women in the justice professions. May be taken for honors.
JUST 500. Criminal Law and Society. 3 hours. Criminal process and constitutional and legal problems associated with arrest, search and seizure, and due process of law. Criminal liability and crimes against persons, property, and society; governmental sanctions of individual conduct as formulated by legislatures and the courts. May be taken for honors.
JUST 501. Criminal Procedure. 3 hours. Laws and constitutional protections that govern the criminal justice process from detection and investigation through arrest, adjudication, and punishment.
JUST 502. Criminal Profiling. 3 hours. The dynamics of human behavior as related to criminal activity. Utilizing sociological, psychological, and criminological theories, the course focuses on the analysis of the crime scene and the various characteristics of the offenders revealed by that analysis. Discusses in detail strategies employed by the FBI and state and local profilers.
SOC 512. Social Stratification. 3 hours. The factors which account for differences in influence, power, and social prestige held by different individuals and groups in the community and the society. Prerequisite: SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology or permission of instructor. May be taken for honors.
JUST 518. Serial Killers. 3 hours. An examination of the phenomenon of serial killers with an emphasis on the social construction of serial murder. An investigation of theories, typologies, and case study analysis of serial killers and their victims. May be taken for honors.
JUST 521. Special Topics in Justice Studies(____). 1-3 hours. Intensive examination and analysis of selected justice topics and issues relevant to justice studies. Prerequisite: Permission of instructor. May be repeated for a maximum of 6 hours if subject varies.
JUST 522. Crime Scenes and the Law of Evidence. 3 hours. A critical examination of evidentiary issues associated with crime scene investigations. Emphasis on the role of the police and the admissibility of evidence at criminal proceedings. May be taken for honors.
SOC 527. Correctional Systems. 3 hours. A critical examination of existing and alternative systems for the control and rehabilitation of persons processed by the juvenile and criminal courts. Prerequisite: SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology or permission of instructor. May be taken for honors.
JUST 528. White Collar Crime. 3 hours. Major issues in business, professional, and official rule violations. Consumer fraud, securities violations, unethical professionalism, and political corruption. May be taken for honors.
JUST 538. Philosophy of Law. 3 hours. Philosophical issues in law using actual cases as well as philosophical writings. Nature of law, judicial reasoning, rights, liberty, responsibility, and punishment. May be taken for honors.
SOC 547. Criminology. 3 hours. Analysis of the social phenomenon of crime, examining the definition, causation, incidence, social control and treatment of criminal behavior in human society, with special emphasis on contemporary issues in criminology. Prerequisite: SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology or permission of instructor. May be taken for honors.
SOC 548. Juvenile Delinquency. 3 hours. Examination of current knowledge about causation, prevention and effective treatment of juvenile delinquency. Includes evaluation of contemporary prevention and control systems, including juvenile courts, diversion programs, institutional care and community based treatment methods. Prerequisite: SOC 100 Introdution to Sociology or permission of instructor. May be taken for honors.
SOC 549. Social Deviance. 3 hours. Theoretical and empirical examination of deviance and the consequences for the individual, community and society and agents of social control. Prerequisite: SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology. May be taken for honors.
POLS 550. Political Philosophy II. 3 hours. The political philosophy of institutions and institutional change. Covers topics from the classical, modern, and contemporary periods such as Aristotle, Montesquieu, the Federalist, Lenin, and Qutb. May be taken for honors.
POLS 562. Law and Politics. 3 hours. Analysis of the Judicative roles performed by federal and state judiciaries in the American political system. Prerequisite: POLS 101 U.S. Politics or POLS 270 Introduction to Political Science. May be taken for honors.
POLS 578. Democratic Theory and Public Opinion. 3 hours. Interpretations of democracy, the degree to which the United states is democratic, and the formation of public opinion and its role in politics in the United States. May be taken for honors.
JUST 591. Native American Sovereignty and the Law. 3 hours. Use of Native American case law to explore the dynamics of Indian sovereignty from the Doctrine of Discovery in the 16th century to contemporary politics of tribal self-determination, including federal Indian law cases and the Wounded Knee trials. May be taken for honors.
SWK 641. Social Work and the Law. 3 hours. Analysis of the dynamic relationship between social work and the US legal system. Emphasis on the role of the social worker in dealing with the legal system and the responsiveness of the legal system to the social needs of the people.
POLS 662. Constitutional Law II. 3 hours. The role of the Supreme Court in the development of the constitutional law of civil liberties and related matters. Prerequisite: POLS 101 U.S. Politics or equivalent. May be taken for honors.
JUST 671. Internship. 3 hours. Assignments in a justice-related placement designed to further the student's integration of theory and practice. Internships are arranged with advisor. Graded on pass-fail basis. SOSCI 695. Senior Seminar in Justice Issues. 3 hours. Comprehensive analysis of selected justice concepts and issues with an emphasis on advanced critical analysis and dialogue. Prerequisites: Senior standing and permission of instructor.
JUST 695. Senior Seminar in Justice Issues. 3 hours. Comprehensive analysis of selected justice concepts and issues with an emphasis on a capstone research project and portfolio.
JUST 698. Directed Readings in Justice Studies. 3 hours. Individual study and research in selected areas of Justice Studies. May be repeated for a maximum of six hours. Prerequisite: Permission of instructor.