The Jack-Roller and the Life History Method: Notes on the Chicago School’s Clifford Shaw and Howard Becker’s Humanistic Narrative of Young Male and Female Delinquents in Different Ages

Shane Blackman

doi:10.1177/11033088211046168

Abstract

Clifford Shaw’s (1930) The Jack-Roller is a landmark study of naturalism, ethnography and crime. It is the ‘own story’ of Stanley—a young delinquent in Chicago. Shaw’s series of ethnographic studies on delinquency sought to humanize deviance in opposition to pathological understandings of delinquency. The article looks on the representation of crimes committed and punishment received by young male and female delinquents. Shaw’s argument focuses on structural inequalities and poverty as the cause of deviance; as a result, female delinquency was not explained by sexual promiscuity, although he failed to recognize young women’s vulnerabilities. The second edition of The Jack-Roller introduced by Howard Becker (1966, Introduction. The Jack-Roller: A delinquent boy’s own story, pp. v–xviii) redefined Shaw’s study within the symbolic interactionist tradition. From the 1950s, Shaw and Becker disagreed over the writing of the deviant’s ‘own story,’ the control of the narrative and the authorial voice. The article adds to the literature on narrative, female deviance and youth delinquency.

Highlights

It is over 90 years since the publication of Shaw’s (1930) The Jack-Roller, the landmark study of naturalism, ethnography and the sociological understanding of crime
The Jack-Roller is the life story of Stanley, a young delinquent in Chicago who Clifford Shaw met as a teenager
The context of Shaw’s study when it appeared was that of positivist criminology, and genetic sterilization programmes for criminals were seen as popular answers to deviance

Summary

Introduction

It is over 90 years since the publication of Shaw’s (1930) The Jack-Roller, the landmark study of naturalism, ethnography and the sociological understanding of crime. Clifford Shaw’s The Jack-Roller has been described by Weidman 117) as the most famous delinquent in sociology and criminology. The Jack-Roller is the life story of Stanley, a young delinquent in Chicago who Clifford Shaw met as a teenager. The book describes Stanley’s childhood problems after his mother died, the violence he experienced from his new stepmother and his drunken father, plus his induction into stealing and robbery in the local community and brutal repression at correctional institutions. The book ends with Stanley moving away from his criminal life, living in a new neighbourhood with a job and married

Objectives

Conclusion