module specification

 A1. To provide students with a historical, theoretical and comparative understanding of the diverse forms of youth culture and youth social organisation;
A2. To explore the social origins of youth gangs and street violence;
A3. To consider the key developments in political mobilisation of young people;
A4. To investigate the concepts and nature of social control in relation to youth;
A5. To develop confidence in use of appropriate learning, analytical and discursive skills when dealing with current youth issues.

 - Young People in a Historical Perspective LO1, LO3
- Youth in Consumer Society LO1, LO3
- Consumerism and Violence LO1, LO2
- The Chicago School: The City and Delinquent Subcultures LO1, LO2
- Collective Violence and Gangs LO1
- The Divided City: Danger, Violence and Seductions of Crime
- The Meanings of Youth Crime and Violence LO2
- Youth Subcultures: Resistance through Ritual LO2
- Neo-tribes or Subcultures LO2
- Youth, Gangs and Violence in Post-communist Countries LO2
- Masculinity and Gangs LO2
- Girls in Gangs LO2
- Youth and Resistance in Late Modernity: LO1

Structure, Social Control and Social Isolation LO4
- Youth Riots LO1
- Political Resistance LO2
- Football hooligans LO3
- Graffiti Subculture LO4
- Zero tolerance? Youth policy in modern Britain

Teaching will comprise weekly lecture workshops. Weblearn is used to supply information about the module including providing students with some key readings; in some of the weeks weblearn-based discussion groups will be used by the students to discuss the lecture and their assignments. Seminar time is allocated for students to discuss their progress with each other. Students are expected to spend approximately 6 hours per week in independent study and writing. Teaching will be informed by research and scholarly activities of the tutors.

 On successful completion of the module, students will be able to:

(LO1) Outline the key themes and issues  in sociology surrounding the nature of youth cultural and political formations and put them in a critical perspectives
(LO2) Identify and analyse the social processes leading to youth gangs and violence
(LO3) Analyse the contemporary youth subcultures
(LO4) Critically assess current youth policies and programmes;

 The 1500 words book review will assess the students’ understanding of the key perspectives on the historical and social dimensions of youth cultural and political formations.  It will be submitted in week 13. The essay of 3000 words will assess the students’ ability to critically analyse youth subcultures, the causes of youth violence and gangs and the political responses to them (due in Week 28).

 Core Reading:
Burke, Roger Hopkins (2016) Young People, Crime and Justice, 2nd ed., London: Routledge

Additional Reading:

Anderson, E. (1999) Code of the Street. Decency, Violence and the Moral Life of the Inner City, W.W.Norton and Company: New York and London.
Briggs, D. (2012), ed. The English Riots of 2011: A Summer of Discontent, Waterside Press.
Brotherton, D. (2015) Youth Street Gangs: A Critical Appraisal, Routledge.
Collins, R. (2008) Violence. A Microsociological Theory. Princeton University Press.
Goffman, A. (2014) On the Run, Palgrave.
Ilan, J. (2015), Understanding Street Culture, Palgrave.
Muncie, J, Hughes, G. & McLaughlin, G. (2002) Youth Justice. Critical Readings, London: Sage.
Hall, S., Winslow, S. & Ancrum, C. (2008) Criminal Identities and Consumer Culture, Cullompton: Willan.
Pitts, J. (2008) Reluctant Gangsters. The changing Face of Youth Crime, Cullompton: Willan.
Hagedorn, J. (2007) Gangs in the Global City: Alternatives to Traditional Criminology, Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
Stephenson, S. (2015) Gangs of Russia, Cornell University Press