Table of Contents
Definitions of Police
- (noun) A State sponsored institution, tasked with preventing or investigating crime, and maintaining public order.
- (verb) To maintain law and order.
Police Pronunciation
Syllabification: po·lice
Audio Pronunciation
Phonetic Spelling
- American English – /puh-lEEs/
- British English – /puh-lEEs/
International Phonetic Alphabet
- American English – /pəˈlis/
- British English – /pᵿˈliːs/
Usage Note
- Police are studied in criminology.
Related Quotation
- “[S]ingling out members of a race or ethnic group for heightened police surveillance—is a way to act on the assumption that whole categories of people are dangerous” (Rosenblum and Travis 2012:199).
Related Videos
Additional Information
- Crime and Law Resources – Books, Journals, and Helpful Links
- Word origin of “police” – Online Etymology Dictionary: etymonline.com
Related Terms
Reference
Rosenblum, Karen Elaine, and Toni-Michelle Travis. 2012. The Meaning of Difference: American Constructions of Race, Sex and Gender, Social Class, Sexual Orientation, and Disability. 6th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Works Consulted
Carrabine, Eamonn, Pam Cox, Maggy Lee, Ken Plummer, and Nigel South. 2009. Criminology: A Sociological Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Routledge.
Griffiths, Heather, Nathan Keirns, Eric Strayer, Susan Cody-Rydzewski, Gail Scaramuzzo, Tommy Sadler, Sally Vyain, Jeff Bry, Faye Jones. 2016. Introduction to Sociology 2e. Houston, TX: OpenStax.
Oxford University Press. (N.d.) Oxford Dictionaries. (https://www.oxforddictionaries.com/).
Wikipedia contributors. (N.d.) Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation. (https://en.wikipedia.org/).
Cite the Definition of Police
ASA – American Sociological Association (5th edition)
Bell, Kenton, ed. 2013. “police.” In Open Education Sociology Dictionary. Retrieved April 18, 2024 (https://sociologydictionary.org/police/).
APA – American Psychological Association (6th edition)
police. (2013). In K. Bell (Ed.), Open education sociology dictionary. Retrieved from https://sociologydictionary.org/police/
Chicago/Turabian: Author-Date – Chicago Manual of Style (16th edition)
Bell, Kenton, ed. 2013. “police.” In Open Education Sociology Dictionary. Accessed April 18, 2024. https://sociologydictionary.org/police/.
MLA – Modern Language Association (7th edition)
“police.” Open Education Sociology Dictionary. Ed. Kenton Bell. 2013. Web. 18 Apr. 2024. <https://sociologydictionary.org/police/>.