Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Issues in Crime and Criminology

by Richard C. Monk

Book Overview

This reader introduces students to controversies in race and ethnicity. The readings reflect a variety of viewpoints and have been selected for their liveliness and substance and because of their... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 007237151X
• ISBN13: 9780072371512
• Release Date: June 2000
• Publisher: Dushkin/McGraw-Hill
• Length: 386 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.3" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Common extremes

I disagree with the other review of this book. The author has chosen fairly familiar viewpoints, no doubt easily recognized by most readers, and the point of the exercises is not to propose one kind of theory or another, but to make the reader think. The author is very up-front about the kinds of theories found in the examples (set forth in the introduction). Each pro and con essay about each topic sets forth a fairly biased viewpoint, and that is the purpose of the exercise. Any reader whose curiosity is piqued by the debate can extend his own knowledge by further reading, such as Stephan Jay Gould's "The Mismeasure of Man" which demolishes the bell curve argument. The point is to enlarge the reader's interest in becoming informed, and the contrasting essays do that. The book is used as a text in a post-grad course at the University of California; it leads one to question one's own prejudices about the topics. Surely that is worthwhile!