Assistant Professor, Critical Criminology
905-688-5550 x4196
smcaleese@brocku.ca
Education:
PhD, Carleton University
MA, University of Ottawa
B.Hon Soc.Sc, University of Ottawa
Samantha McAleese is a critical criminologist and qualitative researcher whose work focuses on the collateral consequences of punishment in Canada and the role of the non-profit sector in supporting people impacted by the criminal legal system. She is a leading expert on record suspensions (formerly known as pardons) and collaborates with other researchers, legal professionals, advocates, and people with lived and living experiences of criminalization and punishment to push for policy and program changes in the area of criminal records management in Canada. She is a member of the Fresh Start Coalition, the International Criminal Justice Voluntary Sector Research Network, the Internet and Digital Sociology research cluster of the Canadian Sociological Association, and a Board member at large for the St. Leonard’s Society of Canada.
Samantha’s ongoing research interests stand at the intersection of critical criminology, feminist sociology, penology, digital criminology, and abolition, and her research agenda and advocacy work seek to deepen understanding of how people identify, navigate, resist, and strive to eliminate structural stigma and the harms of criminalization and punishment.
Klostermann, J., McAleese, S., Montgomery, L., & Rodimon, S. (2020). Working the project: Research proposals and everyday practices for emerging feminist researchers. Canadian Review of Sociology/Revue canadienne de sociologie, 57(2), 305-325.
McAleese, S., & Kilty, J. M. (2020). “Walls are put up when curiosity ends”: Transformative Education in the Canadian Carceral Context. Journal of Prison Education and Reentry (2014-2023), 6(3), 275-293.
McAleese, S. (2019). Doing public criminology with the criminal justice voluntary sector: Methodological reflections and considerations. The Howard journal of crime and justice, 58(3), 366-383.
McAleese, S. (2019). Suspension, not expungement: Rationalizing misguided policy decisions around cannabis amnesty in Canada. Canadian Public Administration, 62(4), 612-633.
McAleese, S., & Kilty, J. M. (2019). Stories matter: Reaffirming the value of qualitative research. The Qualitative Report, 24(4), 822-845.
McAleese, S., Ricciardelli, R., & Peters, A. (2017). Job search, suspended: Changes to Canada’s pardon program and the impact on finding employment. After prison: Navigating employment and reintegration, 83-104.
- SOCI 2F60 – Foundations for Community Engagement
- CRIM 2P61 – Foundations of Critical Criminology
- CRIM 3P37 – Abolition and the Carceral State
- CRIM 4P63 – Life After Incarceration
Samantha is willing to supervise and support research projects that fall within or alongside the following general research areas/topics: Sociology of punishment, processes of criminalization, the non-profit sector/penal voluntary sector, homelessness industrial complex, prison(er) education, structural stigma, administrative burden, collateral consequences of punishment, transformative justice, alternatives to punishment and incarceration, pardons and record suspensions, surveillance studies, public criminology and sociology, penal abolition and abolitionist feminism, digital media literacy, digital criminology and digital stigma, advocacy and activism, community-academic relationships, qualitative research methods.
