ABSTRACT
Different contexts foster different areas for historical study.Many of the social historians who began the current wave of research into crime had been nurtured in the heady political enthusiasm of universities during the 1960s. Their inspiration came from studying ‘history from below’ and particularly the work of Eric Hobsbawm, George Rudé and E. P. Thompson. Much of their interest was directed to the enormous economic and social changes of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The criminal law and the courts were seen as one way into a deeper exploration of class relationships; after initial studies of crowds and rioting, they focused their attention on property crime. A later generation, much more gender sensitive, shifted towards studying crimes of violence – offences which might have been inter-class, but were rather more likely to be inter-gender. In this context the criminal law and the courts were seen as routes into the exploration of gender norms and shifting relationships. The growing interest in cultural history has fostered an interest in the ways that different forms of media constructed and reported crime and the criminal justice system, and how this inter-reacted with popular understanding and policy making.
