Short Answer Question 1 – Crime mapping, a legacy from the Chicago School
QUESTION 1
What relationship are you able to identify between crime and your chosen locations? And what is the potential
of the Chicago School’s ideas to explain the relationships you have identified?
Step One: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDXQTLU2U8g (BOCSAR’s NSW Crime Tool Tutorial)
Access the interactive listed below and compare and contrast crime statistics across different spaces (e.g.
compare suburbs: Manly and Kings Cross) or regions (e.g. Urban and Rural).
Watch BOCSAR’s NSW Crime Tool Tutorial to learn how to use the BOCSAR interactive map.
- Want you to think about the Chicago School’s theoretical conceptualisations of the relationship between
- space and crime, and introduce you to web-based crime mapping platforms as a contemporary example
- of how these theories have affected practice today.
BOCSAR interactive map link: http://crimetool.bocsar.nsw.gov.au/bocsar/
This is a NSW crime mapping tool that provides not only crime data on an interactive map but also provides
trend reports and detailed reports on crimes by location. It uses NSW police reported crime data.
Step Two:
Using your findings from step one write a 500 word (+/-10%) short answer response to the following:
- What relationship are you able to identify between crime and your chosen locations? And what is the
- potential of the Chicago School’s ideas to explain the relationships you have identified?
Your short answer MUST:
- Make use of at least ONE core theoretical idea from the essential reading (e.g. ‘social disorganisation’,
- ‘social control’, ‘social ecology’ or ‘collective efficacy).
- You may include tables, figures and maps in your response. Make sure these are closely tied to your
- response and serve as a way of illustrating the relationships you are describing.
- Include a reference list at the end of your answer.
Short Answer Question 2 – Structural Strains and the Politics of everyday life
QUESTION 2
- How aware are everyday Australian’s about the social-cultural conditions that are said to cause crime to concentrate within poor neighborhoods and amongst disadvantaged populations?
Step 1:
Conduct an interview with someone ask the following questions:
- Why do you think people commit crimes?
- Did you know crime is often concentrated in poor neighbourhoods, why do you think that might be?
- According to your personal experiences, do you think everyone in society has the same opportunities
- to achieve wealth and status?
Step 2:
Using the responses you have gathered from your interviewee write a 500 word (+/- 10%) response to the
following question.
Your short answer MUST:
- Make use of at least ONE core theoretical ideas from the essential readings (e.g. ‘social control’, ‘social disorganization’, ‘collective efficacy’, ‘strain’, ‘block opportunities’, ‘consensus values’).
- Make references to your interviewees answers, but not be a complete transcript of the interview.
- Include a reference list at the end of your answer.