In doing the paper/presentation:

Ideas to think about, and methodologies that will help in the approach of your paper.

So for example, say we take Hobsbawm, and the idea of the ‘social bandit,’ and that the stories and fables
that exist about this individual offer value and insight into their “real” nature or being, can we do the
same in a contemporary sense….

In other words, what is myth, and what is reality, and in what ways do the stories blur,
complicate, or even misinform those lines….

Pancho Villa
Billy the Kid
Jesse James
John Dillinger (the Terror Gang)
Ned Kelly
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Richard Turpin
Rose Dunn
Juraj Janosik
Carmine Crocco
Pablo Escobar
Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow
Guzman Loera
Opal Long
Giuseppe Nicola Summa
Madame St. Clair
Al Capone
“Lucky” Luciano
Pearl Hart
Laura Bullion (Rose of the Wild Bunch)
Belle Siddons (Madam Vestal)
Phoolan Devi

Also, not just criminals, but guerrillas

Che Guevara
Jaime Barbudo
Toussaint L’Ouverture
Pancho Villa
Kinfe Gebremedhin
James Bowie
Wazir Akbar Khan
Vlad the Impaler
William Wallace
Jonas Savimbi
Black Panther Party

So this is more individually based….

It might be interesting to look at the famous lawmen, whose stories are mutually constitutive with the
formation of the state, and also intertwined with the stories of some of the people above…

Wyatt Earp
Henry Newton Brown
Eliot Ness
Bynum Colbert

It would also be interesting to analyze something along the lines of an organization (criminal) in which I
would encourage to look at how social or cultural norms, or political relationships (especially with the
state), have shaped the emergence of that group….

Yakuza
Hong Kong Triads
The Contras (Nicaragua and Honduras)
FARC (Colombia)
The Shining Path (Peru)
The Mexican cartels (Sinaloa, Gulf, Los Zetas, Beltran-Leyva Cartel)
Khun Sa (Burma)
The Order (US white supremacist group)
Remus organization (US prohibition era)
Five Families of New York
Winter Hill Gang (Boston)
Black Mafia
Corsican Mafia
Sicilian organized crime (mafia)
Russian Mafia
Kossacks
Binh Xuyen (Vietnam)
Israeli Mafia (Abergil or Alperon)
Nigerian organized crime (Area Boys and Confraternities)
Gurgaon (India, organs)

But also cyber-crime

ShadowCrew
DarkMArket
the Silk Road
Russian cyber-crime

You could even look at prison gangs, which is fascinating

Aryan Brotherhood
Barrio Azteca
Black Guerrilla Family

Street Gangs
Bloods
Crips

Even historical gangs

You can also look at broader political, economic, and social environments which look to challenge the
narratives of state control or space and place….
Afg-Pak borderlands
Venezuela
Caribbean
Rum Row (prohibition era)
Piracy in the Arabian Sea
in the Pacific Rim
Banditry and political dissent (and terrorism)
Drugs and Taliban
Drugs and FARC
Hezbollah
Haqqani Network

You can also get into issues of policing and punishment

Debates about capital punishment
solitary confinement
for-profit prisons
prison labor
Race and gender in prisons
Or police
Militarization of police
racial disparities in policing
Policing the police
Criminal and civil asset forfeiture

You will be graded on the following

Clarity/overview of person or concept: Did you explain in detail the issue/person and how they
relate to ideas of social banditry, crime, or policing?

Methodology: What do your sources say about your topic? Are there differences in interpretation
or presentation? Are there things your sources aren’t saying? Did you use your sources well

Style of Presentation: Depending on how you choose to present your topic: Is it well written?
Clear? Good use of sources and visuals if you have them?

Minimum 5 sources.

You can present in any format:

Paper: 5-8 pages double spaced
Podcast/film/visual presentation: 10-12 minutes.