START Director and University of Maryland professor of criminology and criminal justice Gary LaFree recently recounted 30 years of leadership in the field of criminology for the Oral History of Criminology Project (OHCP), an ongoing video interview series led by Project Director Brendan Dooley and the American Society of Criminology (ASC).
The interview addressed the broad sweep of LaFree's career, from his undergraduate days as a history major to his present status as leading criminology expert. LaFree specifically touches on how an early reading of French philosopher Michel Foucault's book The Archaeology of Knowledge and his initial post-doctoral research inspired him to pursue a career dedicated to finding better data and methodology.
Dooley is currently in the process of editing the interview's raw footage and expects the final version to be available on ASC's website in the next six weeks.
The OHCP is committed to providing students with living accounts of criminology. According to the Project's home page, OHCP moves beyond what is captured in published texts and uses scholars' own voices to enrich students' understanding of the field and how scholarly paradigms arise and are elaborated.