Upcoming Event – “Sydney Institute of Criminology 50th Anniversary Lecture: Southern Criminology and Global Justice”

The Sydney Institute of Criminology will celebrate its 50th Anniversary with a lecture by QUT’s Professor Kerry Carrington discussing “Southern Criminology and Global Justice”.

• Date: Tuesday 19th April 2016
• Time: 5-6:30pm
• Location: Common Room, Level 4, New Law Building (F10), Eastern Avenue, University of Sydney
• Cost: Free, however registration is essential
• Contact: Professional Learning & Community Engagement
• Phone: 02 9351 0248

About the lecture
Almost 85% of the world’s population live in what might be termed the ‘global south’, comprising three continents. A large proportion of the world’s police and around half of the world’s 10.2 million prisoners are detained in the continents of the global south, across Asia, Africa, Oceania and South America. Yet criminology has concentrated mostly on problems of crime and justice in the Global North. Where criminology has taken root in the global South it has tended to borrow and adapt metropolitan assumptions. Consequently criminologies of the periphery have, until recently, accepted their subordinate role in the global organisation of knowledge. This has stunted the intellectual development and vitality of criminology, both in the South, across Asia and globally. It has also perpetuated the relative neglect of pressing criminological issues which affect both North and South, as well as the neglect of crimes outside the large metropoles of the global north.

This lecture outlines how Southern criminology aims to fill this void, to transform criminological agendas to make them more befitting, inclusive of and responsive to the global problems of justice and security in the 21st century. Southern criminology seeks to globalise and democratise criminological practice and knowledge, to liberate it from its Anglophone northern bias, to renovate its methodological approaches and to inject innovative perspectives into the study of crime and global justice from the periphery. It offers not another form of opposition, but a series of projects of retrieval. Its purpose is not to denounce but to re-orient, not to oppose but to modify, not to displace but to augment.

As a way of illustrating how southern criminology might usefully contribute to better informed responses to global justice, this lecture explores three distinct projects that could be developed under such a rubric. These include firstly, certain forms and patterns of crime specific to the global periphery; secondly, the distinctive patterns of gender and crime in the global south shaped by diverse cultural, social, religious and political factors; and lastly the distinctive historical and contemporary penalities of the global south and their links with colonialism.

About the speaker
Professor Kerry Carrington is the Head of the School of Justice in the Faculty of Law at Queensland University of Technology. She was born in Mt Isa and is the first

Kerry has always been a public intellectual committed to open democratic flow of knowledge. This has made her a sought-after speaker around the world on women, crime and justice systems, and an advocate for a fairer society.

This event is hosted by the Institute of Criminology, Sydney Law School, University of Sydney. Founded in 1966, the Institute has maintained a commitment to critical dialogue on criminal justice matters throughout the past 50 years. This event showcases the Institute of Criminology’s contribution to supportin19Ag new ideas and theoretical innovation.

To register for the event, click here.