Students in Sociology and Criminology can expect to develop the insights of the sociological perspective as they become familiar with continuing research and theoretical analysis of the social world. They learn how to better understand the structures and patterns upon which everyday life rest, to understand the interplay between individual choices and social constraint, to interpret events from multiple perspectives, and to examine social arrangements critically. They learn how to make a difference in their lives and in the lives of others.
Work with Leading Faculty
We are a small, active faculty who publish award-winning monographs, articles in the top journals of our field. We are committed to the public good and our scholarship is used to inform national and local policy debate.
Get Personal Attention
Our classes are small. Faculty-student partnerships are keys to our successful program.
What's Happening
Student's Internships Create Path to Professional Passion
What do the Boulder County Sheriff's office, Boulder County District Attorney's office, Lt. Governor's office, Colorado Governor's office and the Secret Service all have in common? These are offices and law enforcement agencies where Lynzi Maas, a senior double majoring in criminology and socio-legal studies, has held internships over the last four years.
Maas became interested in studying crime and specifically the causes of crime, those who commit crimes and why it happens while in high school. Her decision to attend the University of Denver was based on the criminology program the university offered. She added the socio-legal studies major because it allows her to look at how law is impacted by society.
On October 3, 2012, DU hosted the first of three presidential debates. We are offering post-debate events to continue discussions of political, social and cultural issues leading up to and following the election. For more information, please visit http://debate2012.du.edu/.
Professor Jeffrey Lin studies crime and punishment in the United States. His research, spanning the last decade, has informed significant changes to the New York City juvenile justice system and parole supervision practices in California. Since coming to DU, he has begun working with the state of Colorado to assess the effectiveness of new strategies of supervising offenders in the community. He has also started to study the management of sex offenders, assessing the utility of laws designed to control their continued offending. 