Wednesday 25 January 2017 Teesside University

Human Enhancement Drugs: The Illicit Steroid Market and the Legal Supplement Industry

Katinka van de Ven and Kyle Mulrooney

While the origins of human enhancement drugs (HEDs) date back over 100 years, the drive for human enhancement has been insatiable and continues to grow. Millions of people take HEDs (also known as ‘performance and image enhancing drugs’ or ‘lifestyle drugs’), from elite level athletes and sport and exercise enthusiasts, who hope to further their athletic aspirations or achieve better bodies, to working students and adults seeking to get ahead in their studies or careers, to everyday men and women seeking to defy the ageing process or who are generally interested in healthy living and well-being. However, the legality of HEDs is not so black and white, and the fact remains that certain compounds sold can have serious health consequences. Some HEDs, such as vitamins, minerals and supplements are bought and sold legally on the open market in many countries, while others such as methylphenidate or testosterone fall into a semi-legal category in that they may be available by prescription, while still yet others such as 2,4-Dinitrophenol (DNP) or ephedrine are illegal and available only on the black market. The precarious legal position of human enhancement drugs means that the sale of these substances is ripe for criminological inquiry while their widespread availability means human enhancement drugs are likely to become a growing public health issue. In this presentation, we will provide an overview of the different types of HEDs and highlight some of the issues surrounding them. We will then zoom in a little closer and explore in more detail two specific HED markets; the illicit steroid market and the legal market for sports supplements.

 

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Wednesday 3 February 2016 Teesside University

‘What are you looking at? Disentangling the subject, space and hegemonic in male violence’

Dr Anthony Ellis – The University of Salford

Dr Ellis discussed findings from his recently published research monograph ‘Men, Masculinities and Violence: An Ethnographic Study’ (Routledge), which is a ground-breaking empirical and theoretical study exploring male violence, trauma, class and social space.

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2015 – The North East Branch held their re-launch event in June 2015, at Durham University.

The event marked the formation of a network of North East based criminologists and a platform for academics, postgraduate students and criminal justice practitioners to engage in exciting work happening across the region and beyond.

Over the coming years the BSC North East Regional Network will host seminars and events across North East universities and attract local, national and international speakers involved in research and practice at the cutting-edge of the discipline. It is in this context that the theme of the first event discussed the experiences of academics based at Durham University as they embarked upon the journey of introducing the Inside-Out programme to the UK.

An Introduction to Inside-Out: principles, pedagogy and challenges in introducing it to the UK.

Dr Kate O’Brien and Dr Hannah King

(Inside-Out Prison Exchange Programme, Durham University)

This presentation reflected upon experiences of delivering the Inside Out Prison Exchange Programme inside HMP Durham and HMP Frankland during 2014-15.  Originally developed at Temple University in Philadelphia in 1997, Inside-Out is a prison education programme designed to break down barriers and prejudices and provide undergraduate students (‘outside students’) and prisoners (‘inside students’) with a unique opportunity to study together as peers behind the prison walls.  Durham University is the first institution outside of North America to deliver the Inside-Out programme.  The presentation included an outline of some of the challenges faced setting up and delivering the Inside-Out programme in the UK, and an examination of the value and potential of the Inside-Out pedagogical approach for ‘teaching’ criminology to students located on both sides of the wall.