| Abstract [eng] |
Jovita Žėkaitė-Maconko’s dissertation, The Field of Criminological Knowledge: A Case Study of Cyberbullying, examines how criminological knowledge is constructed, legitimised, and reproduced within the academic field of criminology. Drawing on P. Bourdieu’s field theory, criminology is analysed as a space of structured positions in which different agents of the academic field compete for authority, visibility, and symbolic capital. The study applies a semi-systematic literature review, while research on cyberbullying is selected as an empirical case that makes it possible to reveal the logic of criminologists’ practices within an interdisciplinary academic field. The dissertation addresses the problem that criminological knowledge is neither neutral nor based solely on empirical data. It is shaped by the rules of academic publishing, citation practices, funding priorities, methodological tendencies, and relations of power. The study shows that, when analysing cyberbullying, criminologists often adapt to already established research models, reproduce concepts developed in other disciplines, and orient themselves towards the logic of publication and academic visibility. The dissertation reveals how habitus, forms of capital, and the rules of the academic field shape criminologists’ research choices, positioning, and capacity to develop an autonomous disciplinary perspective. The study contributes to debates in critical criminology by showing that the boundaries of criminological knowledge are formed not only by the phenomena under investigation, but also by the power structure of the academic field. |
