Dr David Fonseca

My scholarly trajectory spans a few different geographical areas, always involved with questions revolving around crime, punishment and crime control. This path began a few years ago, when first engaging with criminology and social theory. After receiving a law degree in Brazil, I have pursued a LL M in the Netherlands at the University of Utrecht, studying the process of internationalization of crime and criminal justice. Soon afterwards, I have also obtained a LL M in Brazil, discussing criminal law and criminological theories at the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG). Subsequently, my interests turned to the sociology of punishment, as mass incarceration emerged as a pressing contemporary problem. For that reason, I have decided to move to the USA to understand better this process. There, I have achieved a PhD from the sociology department at New York University (NYU), where I have closely worked with the Law School and the Institute for Law and Society.

My teaching experience also covers different regions. In Brazil, besides adjunct positions earlier in my career, I have held tenured positions at the Universidade Federal de Goiás (UFG) and the Universidade Federal do Sul da Bahia (UFSB). Between 2016 and 2018, I have also been a lecturer in the School of Law of the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Australia, where I was also a member of the Crime and Justice Research Centre. While there, I had the opportunity to contribute to the development of southern criminology, which is still an ongoing project. For the first time as an academic in England, I came to the School of Law of the University of Sheffield in April 2024, seeking to comprehend the challenges of social control in western democracies at current times.