Genetic screening, new reproductive technologies, the promise of gene therapies, and the possibility of cloning have made biological solutions to human social problems seem plausible. Creating Born Criminals shows us how history can guide us in responding to the reemergence of eugenics. In this first social history in sixty years of biological theories of crime, Nicole Hahn Rafter examines those theories' origins as well as their content and demonstrates...

From a look at classics like 'Psycho' and 'Double Indemnity' to recent films like 'Traffic' and 'Thelma & Louise', Nicole Rafter and Michelle Brown show that criminological theory is produced not only in the academy, through scholarly research, but also in popular culture, through film.