Instructor Spotlight: Maxwell Shoustal and Julieta Grané

Tell us about yourself and what inspired you to teach this course

Julieta Grané: I took a gap year between the end of high school and the start of college, during which I watched and listened to a lot of true crime. I’ve always been very social justice-oriented, so my obsession with this genre made me wonder what the ethical weight of true crime media consumption might be. Learning more about critical theory made me think that there was an opportunity to create a course that combined the entertaining aspects of true crime with a socially-conscious investigation into the genre.

Maxwell Shoustal: My mom is always watching true crime, so it was always playing on my TV growing up. I think I sat down to watch it with her first out of morbid curiosity, but I came to like it almost as much as she does. Julieta and I bonded over our shared interest in true crime and political issues, so this course combines both of those fascinations.

What is your favorite piece of true crime media?

JG: My favorite true crime documentary is Crime of the Century, an HBO Original two-part documentary chronicling the opioid epidemic in the United States. This might seem like an unconventional pick because most true crime focuses on violent crime, but one of the things  we talked about in class was whether white collar cases like this one can be called “true crime.” I think this documentary effectively conveys the widespread impact of opioids with a clear focus on the Sackler family as primary culprits.

MS: My favorite piece of true crime media is probably Tiger King. The show became really culturally significant during the pandemic, and I think it exemplifies everything that people find entertaining about true crime.

Why do we seem obsessed with consuming media about crime?

JG: In a strange way, true crime can be cathartic. The stories often teach us that the bad guys are gone and justice prevailed in the end, which makes people feel safe. However, it's harder to explain why people like learning about unsolved cases so much. These types of shows frustrate me personally, and I can only speculate as to why so many people enjoy them.

To what extent is true crime really “true”?

JG: True crime is “true” to the extent that the cases attempt to explain an instance of supposed crime, but there are a lot of factors a person should consider in determining its veracity. The genre can privilege certain perspectives over others and treat victims or perpetrators unfairly depending on their backgrounds. True crime also rarely fully captures the possibility of growth after a crime has been committed.