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Canyon College

CJ580: Race, Ethnicity in Crime and Social Justice
SYLLABUS

Instructor: Prof. Michael L. Beshears

Office hours: Online Course Instructor email: beshears@canyoncollege.edu Textbook: Multicultural Law Enforcement, Second Edition (2002) by R. Shusta, D. Levine, P. Harris, H. Wong. NJ: Prentice-Hall, ISBN 013033409X.

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Course Description

This course analyzes the relationships between race, ethnicity, and crime in the justice system, and the effect that social policy has on racial and ethnic inequality. The theories of ethnic and racial justice are also presented in relationship to their effect on crime and criminal justice.

Extensive readings, cases, briefs, and Internet resources focus on the issues of cultural sensitivity, privilege, intimidation, flashpoint encounters, and the influence of prejudice on organizations and people. Community policing is also covered for how it can be configured to incorporate changing for diversity. Law enforcement is used only as an example of how multiculturalism can impact public service agencies. Student participation is expected via email, bulletin board forums, and online quizzes.

This course requires a working familiarity with computers, possession of a personal computer, an Internet connection, and an email account. By registering for this course, students are expected to have their own equipment, access, and proficiency to browse the Internet, send and receive emails, attach documents (Microsoft Word required-Microsoft Works is not sufficient) to emails, and participate in-group discussions. There is no face-to-face contact in this course.

Learning Objectives:

• To obtain familiarity with the legal, ethical, and practical aspects of cross-cultural contacts
• To appreciate the impacts of diversity and multiculturalism on the justice system and society
• To gain a practical understanding of how police agencies can respond both internally and externally to demographic changes
• To gain insights into the theories and frameworks for understanding how prejudice and discrimination affect organizations and individuals

Attendance and Participation:

Students are expected to be mature enough to discipline themselves and know when they are having attendance problems. They are expected to check in initially and weekly by email after the course starts.  There is a week's deadline for all course requirements, and not doing weekly assignments (as explained on the course schedule) promptly results in recording of a virtual absence point. Online Exams: (50% of grade)
Exams are a fairly important part of this course. There will be two major exams: a midterm and a final with 1 or 2 announced online quizzes, which count as the other (50% of your grade).

Grading System: All assignments are given a letter grade with the following scale applied:

A = 94	A- = 91	B+ = 88
B = 83	B- = 80	C+ = 77
C = 74	C- = 70	D+ = 66
D = 61	F = 57 or less

Lecture List CJ580 and 8 Week Course Schedule

Note:Lecture numbers below do not necessarily correlate with the assigned reading chapter assignment number e.g., chapter 5 may not go with lecture 5 listed below. Therefore, scroll to the bottom of this page to see the course schedule to know, which lecture listed below is to be read during the week or that corresponds with the assigned weekly reading. Click on the lecture below to be taken to that specific lecture.

LECTURES:

1. The Definition and Meaning of Prejudice
2. Overview Physical Anthropology & Black History
3. Discrimination Law
4. Agency Racism/Oversight/Regulation
5. Hate Crimes & Their Enforcement
6. The Role of Community Policing
7. Social Class and Community Analysis
8. Understanding Discrimination against Gays and Lesbians
9. Understanding Discrimination against Immigrants
10. Illegal Immigration and Crime
11. Understanding Discrimination against Asian Americans
12. Understanding Discrimination against African Americans
13. Understanding Discrimination against Hispanic/Latino Americans
14. Understanding Discrimination against Arab Americans
15. Understanding Discrimination against Indigenous Peoples/Native Americans
16. Ageism and Age Discrimination
17. 10 Most Important Events in Black History

8-Week Course Calendar:

Week One	Definitions & Explanations of Prejudice, History of Official Discrimination, Law, Hate Crime, Bias Crime	Read: Shusta ch 1-3 and Online Lectures 1-4 Take Online Practice Quiz
Week Two	Oppression of Difference Critical Race Theory Intersections of Race/Class/Gender	Read: Shusta chs 4-5 and chs 11-13 and Online Lectures 4-5 Take Online Quiz 1
Week Three	Cultural Sensitivity, Semantics, Semiotics, Language Barriers	Read: Shusta ch 14-15 and Online Lectures 6-7
Week Four	Contacts with Specific Groups- Sex and Gender MIDTERM EXAM	Read: Online Lectures 8-10
Week Five	Contacts with Specific Groups - African- & Asian- Americans	Read: Shusta chs 6-7 and Online Lectures 11-12
Week Six	Contacts with Specific Groups - Latino/Hispanic Americans	Read: Shusta ch 8 and Online Lecture 13 Take Online Quiz 2
Week Seven	Contacts with Specific Groups - Arab & Middle Eastern Americans	Read: Shusta ch 9 and Online Lecture 14
Week Eight	Contacts with Specific Groups - Native Americans FINAL EXAM	Read: Shusta ch 10 and Online Lectures 15-16

MORE ABOUT ONLINE COURSES

DO NOT PRINT OUT all or most of the online lectures and other materials at the instructor's website. They are intended to be read online or downloaded to a PDA. What I have posted on the Internet is essentially an e-book, totaling over 1GB in file size. They are often updated, so it does little good to print them all out in advance and put them in a binder. It is also foolish to try and print out all the content at the hyperlinks to external sites at the bottom of each lecture. You'd be printing for days. I will try to announce content updates and changes as they happen, but the preferred method for reading in this course is online, taking advantage of all the embedded hyperlinks, dynamic Internet resources, Javascript applets, and other interactive media that is typical of an online course. Please make a habit of hitting the Refresh or Reload icon on your web browser to make sure you are viewing the latest version of a page at this site, or set your browser settings to refresh automatically. You definitely need to know how to Refresh a page's content to make sure you're looking at the most recent version of a post.

The ideal student in a web-based course will have the following characteristics:

• They will be independent learners, capable of looking at problems critically and finding solutions to them with a minimum of assistance.
• They will be disinclined to procrastinate. Anyone who gets behind in their work in a web- based course will find it very difficult to catch up.
• They will be computer literate, and able to negotiate problems with their computer hardware and software as well as network connection when they occur. They will need very little hand holding in this area.
• They will have sufficient time to devote to the course and its requirements, although that time may involve unconventional or irregular intervals.
• They will have good communication skills, so that inquiries to the instructor will be specific and not require clarification and inevitable delay to obtain an answer.
• They will be able to take advantage of the research resources available to them via the Internet and whatever library they may have access to.

Quizzes and exams will not be proctored, but require entering the login and password given the student by the main campus. You are on your honor that you, and only you, are the one taking the course and taking the exams. Security login names and passwords assigned to individual students may change throughout the course, or other methods may be used to ensure honesty. Only a small number of answers can be looked up in the lectures because students will find that, even with the help of sample exams, online quizzes and exams are extremely difficult and require going beyond memorization.