Latino Criminology: Unfucking Colonial Frameworks in “Latinos and Crime” Scholarship

Abstract

To “unfuck” is to correct a situation, or yourself, if necessary, and in a timely manner. There is an enduring need to audit and deconstruct the colonial features of criminological theory and criminal justice practices. To better understand these enduring colonial inheritances, this article offers a forward-looking prospectus on the merits of a Latino criminology and highlights the shared historical and conceptual overlaps between critical criminology and Latino Studies in studying interpersonal harms, racialized social control, and state violence. Compatible with both orthodox and progressive perspectives in criminology and criminal justice scholarship, an emergent and politically reflexive Latino criminology centers the margins by articulating areas of intervention for scholars to improve criminological inquiry and depart—or unfuck ourselves—from the many settler colonial and white supremacist inheritances of our field.