Simon, Jonathan. Mass Incarceration on Trial: A Remarkable Court Decision and the Future of Prisons in America. The New Press, 2014.
The book focuses on a handful of court cases that have significantly affected law regarding prisons and prisoners in California. While Simon is ultimately arguing that mass incarceration is wrong and should be discontinued everywhere in the United States, he says that he focused specifically on California for this book because California's prison system is the worst and most over-crowded. What we learn here, though, applies throughout the country.
Pros: This book contains a lot of information about court cases with direct bearing on the problems inherent in a mass incarceration system--especially one that consistently operates at 200-300% over capacity. It also does a good job of centering the importance of social narratives: The way we think about prisoners affects how we're willing to (mis)treat them, and sometimes changing the narrative is even more important than changing individual laws.
Cons (no pun intended): The book was repetitive. It was clear and easy to read, but each chapter repeated too much information from previous chapters, which became irritating over time.
There were glancing references to issues of race and class, but it seemed to me that these subjects--so important when discussing the justice and penal systems--were glossed over more than I would have expected.
Sunday, July 9, 2017
Thursday, July 6, 2017
The High King's Golden Tongue. Megan Derr.
Derr, Megan. The High King's Golden Tongue. Less Than Three Press, 2015.
The first thing you should probably know when figuring out whether you'd enjoy this book is that the author is particularly into writing m/m slash. "I love writing slash," she says on her website, "it works for me in a way that writing other things never did." I don't quite know how to describe what this means, but you'll know it if you're into the stuff: The book reads a lot like m/m slash. I guess in part what I'm identifying is that it's kind of a lot about the sex...but it's not porn or erotica, exactly. It's slash. If this isn't making any sense, you could just read the book to get a sense of what I mean.
The first thing you should probably know when figuring out whether you'd enjoy this book is that the author is particularly into writing m/m slash. "I love writing slash," she says on her website, "it works for me in a way that writing other things never did." I don't quite know how to describe what this means, but you'll know it if you're into the stuff: The book reads a lot like m/m slash. I guess in part what I'm identifying is that it's kind of a lot about the sex...but it's not porn or erotica, exactly. It's slash. If this isn't making any sense, you could just read the book to get a sense of what I mean.
Soul On Ice. Eldridge Cleaver.
Cleaver, Eldridge. Soul On Ice. Delta, 1968.
Soul On Ice is a collection of essays Cleaver wrote during his nine years in Folsom State Prison. He covers various topics, from Muhammad Ali's boxing career to "soul food" to Malcolm X vs. Elijah Muhammad to the relationship between black men and white women. The tone is personal, even casual throughout most of the essays, like Cleaver's talking to the reader directly.
There's some rough content in here, but it's also fascinating and worth reading. It's been a little while since I actually read it, and apparently I didn't write much about it at the time, so I'm going to leave this entry short and sweet for now. Later on, when I re-read it (as inevitably happens eventually), I'll add.
Soul On Ice is a collection of essays Cleaver wrote during his nine years in Folsom State Prison. He covers various topics, from Muhammad Ali's boxing career to "soul food" to Malcolm X vs. Elijah Muhammad to the relationship between black men and white women. The tone is personal, even casual throughout most of the essays, like Cleaver's talking to the reader directly.
There's some rough content in here, but it's also fascinating and worth reading. It's been a little while since I actually read it, and apparently I didn't write much about it at the time, so I'm going to leave this entry short and sweet for now. Later on, when I re-read it (as inevitably happens eventually), I'll add.
Wednesday, July 5, 2017
Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses. Louis Althusser.
Althusser, Louis. "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses." From Lenin and Philosophy and other Essays, tr. Ben Brewster. New Left Books, 1971. In Contemporary Critical Theory, ed. Dan Latimer. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1989.
Okay, so Althusser starts with Marx' ideas of "infrastructure" and "superstructure." There's the infrastructure--the economic base--and the superstructure, which stands atop the infrastructure. The superstructure has two parts: culture (law, politics, art, etc) and ideology (world views, values, beliefs).
Althusser adds to the superstructure the concept of Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs), which he distinguishes from the Repressive State Apparatus (RSA). The RSA includes all the agencies that function by direct violence (police, courts, prisons, etc).
Okay, so Althusser starts with Marx' ideas of "infrastructure" and "superstructure." There's the infrastructure--the economic base--and the superstructure, which stands atop the infrastructure. The superstructure has two parts: culture (law, politics, art, etc) and ideology (world views, values, beliefs).
Althusser adds to the superstructure the concept of Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs), which he distinguishes from the Repressive State Apparatus (RSA). The RSA includes all the agencies that function by direct violence (police, courts, prisons, etc).
The Curse of Chalion. Lois McMaster Bujold.
Bujold, Lois McMaster. The Curse of Chalion. Harper Voyager, 2006.
This is the first book in the Chalion series, though actually I read one of the later books first. It was a "found this on my bookshelf" situation, and I enjoyed it enough that I then sought out The Curse of Chalion so that I could continue being in the series' world. It took me a while--I think I read the first book over a year ago--but here we finally are.
This is the first book in the Chalion series, though actually I read one of the later books first. It was a "found this on my bookshelf" situation, and I enjoyed it enough that I then sought out The Curse of Chalion so that I could continue being in the series' world. It took me a while--I think I read the first book over a year ago--but here we finally are.
The Morning They Came for Us: Dispatches from Syria. Janine Di Giovanni.
Di Giovanni, Janine. The Morning They Came for Us: Dispatches from Syria. Liveright, 2016.
Di Giovanni works at Newsweek, regularly writes for a bunch of other big news sources--The New York Times, Granta, The Guardian, etc.--and has published multiple books based on her experiences as a war correspondent in different countries. If you'd like to see and hear her, check out her TedTalk, "What I Say in the War." You can also link to various articles and other video/audio on her web site.
Di Giovanni works at Newsweek, regularly writes for a bunch of other big news sources--The New York Times, Granta, The Guardian, etc.--and has published multiple books based on her experiences as a war correspondent in different countries. If you'd like to see and hear her, check out her TedTalk, "What I Say in the War." You can also link to various articles and other video/audio on her web site.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)