Historically, babies born in Kettleman City, CA have been healthy. But in the past three years, eleven babies have been born with birth defects, and three have had serious enough defects to lead to their deaths. Many of the residents live below poverty, and a number are migrant workers regularly exposed to pestides and pesticide pollution. Kettleman's water sources are also contaminated. There is also a nearby landfill, the largest landfill in the US west of Alabama. These two large landfills in Kettleman and Alabama are both operated by Waste Management Incorporated. Waste Management has proposed extending the size of the Kettleman landfill by 50%. Residents have attempted to block Waste Management's request, and this endeavor is an excellent example of environmental justice in action.

For further details see:
http://motherjones.com/environment/2010/07/kettleman-city-toxic-birth-de...

Bjorn Lomborg, a noted critic of global warming research and author of "The Skeptical Environmentalist," has altered his position, recently noting that global warming is "undoubtedly one of the chief concerns facing the world today" and "a challenge humanity must confront". In his newest book, to be released new month, Lomborg details the need to invest in policies that address global warming, which he argues could solve the problem by the end of this century. Lomborg argued that as much as half of the needed funds can be generated by taxes on carbon emissions.

For further details see http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/30/bjorn-lomborg-climate-...

Please see the attached flyer, introducing Walter DeKeseredy's latest book:

The concept of critical criminology – that crime and the present day processes of criminalization are rooted in the core structures of society – is of more relevance today than it has been at any other time.

Written by an internationally renowned scholar, Contemporary Critical Criminology introduces the most up-to-date empirical, theoretical, and political contributions made by critical criminologists around the world. In its exploration of this material, the book also challenges the erroneous but widely held notion that the critical criminological project is restricted to mechanically applying theories to substantive topics, or to simple calling for radical political, economic, cultural, and social transformations.

This book is an essential source of reference for both undergraduate and postgraduate students of Criminology, Criminal Theory, Social Policy, Research Methodology, and Penology.

Call for Nominations for 2010 Awards
 
Division on Critical Criminology (DCC), American Society of Criminology
 
The DCC Awards Committee invites you to consider nominating individuals for one of the following awards:

• The Lifetime Achievement Award honors an individual's sustained and distinguished scholarship, teaching, and/or service in the field of critical criminology.
• The Critical Criminologist of the Year Award honors a person for distinguished accomplishments which have symbolized the spirit of the Division in some form of scholarship, teaching, and/or service in a recent year or years.
• The Undergraduate Student Paper Awards recognize and honor outstanding theoretical or empirical critical criminological scholarship by undergraduate students.
• The Graduate Student Paper Awards recognize and honor outstanding theoretical or empirical critical criminological scholarship by graduate students.

critcrim.org visitors and friends

Many of the books that have been highlighted on this site were written by members of the Division or Section. In some cases links were added at the request of the author. These links were removed in a previous version of this site, and I was encouraged to bring them back, so I want to explain the recent decision to remove the links.

The following article describes the wider issues, but the short version is that I have never been totally comfortable with these advertisements and am reluctant to continue directing sales to this particular company. I am working on alternatives that will allow us to continue the effort to highlight books of interest to critical criminologists.

The following, by David Serota, helps explain the context of this decision:

Message from Dawn Rothe:

I wanted to let all of our Division members know that we have at this point renewed our contract with Springer. Springer has have offered to donate 200.00 towards book purchases for the winner of the Critical Criminologist award as well as 100.00 worth of books for the winner of the graduate student paper awards. Additionally, given the overwhelming DCC member vote to support a request for the inclusion of Springer's recognition of the Division's choice of editor and terms of service, Springer has included terms of editorial ship for one term of 3 years with a possible extension of one additional term (not to exceed 6 years). While this is a compromise from the 3/2 we voted on, it is a major accomplishment and a minor compromise given the overall situation. Additionally, as has been pointed out, a 3/3 is a common practice with other Divisions as well as ASC main journals.

For those interested in Critical Crim beyond the US borders...

Monash Criminology is pleased to announce that the 2009 ANZ Critical Criminology Conference Proceedings were published in December.
The proceedings are available from: http://www.arts.monash.edu.au/criminology/c3-conference-proceedings

Duties: The Post-Doctoral Scholar will work with USF Criminology Professors, Fridell and Lynch. The Scholar will work on the National Police Research Platform. NIJ has funded a 3-year pilot of this multi-faceted, large-scale, longitudinal "platform" for learning about police and policing. The Scholar will assist with the implementation of multiple methodologies (e.g., survey, interview, focus groups, observation, archival data collection) to research an array of policing topics. S/he will work with the top policing researchers in the nation on this revolutionary project.

The Winter 2009 edition of The Critical Criminologist is now available:
Vol. 19, Issue 3 Winter 2009

Bonnie Berry is editing a new book series. Please see the attached call for proposals.

Ashgate Publishing will produce a new book series, Green Criminology, to promote original scholarlship
contributing to the expanded study of environmental harm, crime, law and justice from a criminological
perspective. Michael J. Lynch and Paul B. Stretesky will serve as series editors. The series is expected to
publish between three to twelve books per year. See attached annoucement for further details.

The Division of Critical Criminology is currently taking applications for the following position:

Editor(s) of the Critical Criminologist Newsletter

Job Duties:

Keeping it Radical: Exploring Income, Income Inequality and Poverty Data for the US.
 
Michael J. Lynch (Department of Criminology, University of South Florida)
 

 
YOU ARE INVITED TO ATTEND AND PARTICIPATE IN...
 
Justice Studies Association
12th Annual Conference
June 2-5, 2010
Knoxville, Tennessee