NCJ Number
87684
Date Published
1981
Length
19 pages
Annotation
Deviance is a spatial concept in that a deviant act is an act which is intentionally hidden from the view or awareness of others.
Abstract
Unusual actions which may be classified as innocent, aberrant, or defiant are not deviant either because they take place in public or because their occurrence in privacy is not intentional. In addition, many actions take place in private but under circumstances where the privacy can be penetrated if needed. However, someone committing a deviant act intends for the screen which shields the behavior to be impenetrable. The deviant act is performed in the space and time of physics, and the screen provides either spatial or temporal shielding of the act. Screens provide cover in at least four different ways. They may hide the act, the traces, or both. They may hide the noise and smell of an act rather than just the sight of it. They may vary in permeability in terms of their denseness, the likelihood of violation, and the extent or duration of their effect. They may also vary in their scale or range. Screens also operate through time in that opportunities for deviance may occur at a particular location regularly or by chance. Screens may also be physical barriers like doors and locks or conventional barriers like a tacit agreement not to stare in a public dressing room. All humans learn that certain acts should not be performed; thus deviance is a pervasive entity which is countersocial rather than antisocial. All forms of deviance emphasize the physical materiality of the human condition. Society should not try to eliminate the shadowed spaces in which deviance occurs, since these spaces permit the practice of behaviors which may later form the basis for social change and new societal norms. A bibliography containing 380 sources is located at the end of the volume containing this paper.