Public Understandings of Hate Crime: Ireland, North and South

This will be a presentation of data from the ground-breaking Irish Research Council (IRC) funded PUHC project and hosted by the European Centre for the Study of Hate.

Speakers:

Professor Amanda Haynes, Department of Sociology.

Professor Jennifer Schweppe, School of Law.

Dr Kevin Brown, Queens University Belfast.

Professor Zoë James, the University of Plymouth, UK.

This event may be recorded for future promotional use by the University of Limerick.

All venues are wheelchair accessible but should you have any specific accessibility queries, please contact us at: Research@ul.ie

Dr Amanda Haynes is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Limerick, Ireland. Her research interests centre on the analysis of physical, discursive, and classificatory violences, and their relationship to prejudice. Her current interests centre on hate crime, policing, stigma and minority access to justice. She has been published in high-ranking journals such as New Media and Society. Her published works include the edited collections Critical Perspectives on Hate Crime: Contributions from the Island of Ireland (2017, Palgrave Macmillan). Her work has been funded by the European Commission, the Irish Research Council, and the Irish Council for Civil Liberties. Amanda's commitment to her students was recognised twice by the University of Limerick, where she was awarded the Excellent in Teaching Award in 2005 and 2011. Following her service on the executive committee of the Sociological Association of Ireland, she was elected President of the Association for the 2008 term.

Professor Jennifer Schweppe

Having graduated with a BCL from UCD, Jennifer was awarded an open postgraduate scholarship while completing her LLM by research. She was then awarded an internship with the Federal Defender Programme in Chicago, after which she worked as a legal researcher in the Office of the Attorney General and as a legal researcher for the Law Reform Commission before beginning work at UL in 2004. Jennifer was President of the Irish Association of Law Teachers for 2009–2010. She completed a graduate diploma in Academic Practice at UL and won the Small Group Teaching Award at UL in 2010. She was awarded a National Award for Excellence in Teaching by the National Academy for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning in 2011 and was a finalist for the European Award for Excellence in Teaching in the Humanities and Social Sciences in 2012.

Dr Kevin J. Brown is a Reader in Criminal Law and Justice at Queen’s University Belfast. His research centres on the intersection between criminal law and society, with a particular emphasis on its effects on marginalised groups. Proficient in both qualitative and quantitative research methods, Kevin has a decade’s long track record of publishing in esteemed international journals, producing impactful reports, and securing research funding. His three main areas of interest are 1) Public Space and the Law: Investigating the relationship between criminal law and the utilisation of public space, focusing on trends in law reform that increasingly regulate public space in the context of gentrification, consumerism, and crime control. Kevin also explores the appropriate role of criminal law when the use of public space is contested; 2) Older Victims of Crime: Exploring crimes affecting older individuals and evaluating the justice system's response, with a focus on unequal access to justice for older victims of crime. This includes commissioned work for relevant bodies and advocacy for age as a protected characteristic in hate crime legislation; 3) Hate Crime: Aligning with the broader theme of protecting vulnerable groups from victimisation, Kevin contributes to hate crime literature through involvement in legislative reviews, commissioned research, and cross-border studies on public attitudes toward hate crime.

Professor Zoë James

Zoë James is full Professor of Criminology at the University of Plymouth, UK. Her key research interests lie in examining hate from a critical perspective with a particular focus on the harms of hate experienced by Gypsies, Travellers and Roma. Zoë’s research has explored how mobility, accommodation, policing and planning have impacted the lived experience of Gypsies, Travellers and Roma. Zoë is Co-Director of the International Network for Hate Studies and has published and presented her work nationally and internationally, most recently authoring a monograph The Harms of Hate against Gypsies and Travellers: A critical hate studies perspective.