Sociology/Criminology: Are Prisons Obsolete? with Professor Les Back from Goldsmiths, University of London

The UK prison population is rising year on year but paradoxically this is happening at the precise moment when the crime rate is falling.  How can this true?

Professor Les Back, globally renowned in this field, explores this pattern in the wider context of how we understand crime sociologically.  He will do this with Simon Williams, a former prison inmate, who is in the third year of his sociology degree at Goldsmiths.

Through their dialogue students will get an insight to what life is really like in prison and also a wider historical and sociological perspective that challenges common preconceptions about crime.

Drawing on debates about prison abolishionist in the US they ask: are prisons working or are they obsolete?

Lecturer Biography: Professor Les Back

Suitable for: Year 12 Sociologists (This session links straightforwardly to the ‘Crime and Deviance’ stream within A Level Sociology). Geography and Politics students may also be interested in taking part.

Preparation/Pre-Reading: None required.