The Long Term
Resisting Life Sentences Working Toward Freedom
Published on 9. October 2018
Book
Paperback/Softback
250 pages
978-1-60846-899-7 (ISBN)
Description
Long Term Offenders, or LTOs, is the state's term for those it condemns to effective death by imprisonment. Often serving sentences of sixty to eighty years, LTOs bear the brunt of the bipartisan embrace of mass incarceration heralded by the "tough on crime" agenda of the 1990s and 2000s. Like the rest of the United States' prison population--the world's highest per capita--they are disproportionately poor and non-white. The Long Term brings these often silenced voices to light, offering a powerful indictment of the prison-industrial complex from activists, scholars, and those directly surviving and resisting these sentences. In showing the devastation caused by a draconian prison system, the essays also highlight the humanity and courage of the people most affected. This striking collection of essays gives voice to people both inside and outside prison struggling for liberation, dismantles claims that the "tough on crime" agenda and LTO sentencing keep us safe, and reveals the white supremacism and patriarchy upon which the prison system rests. In its place, the contributors propose a range of far-reaching reforms and raise the even more radical demand of abolition, drawing on the experience of campaigns in the United States and beyond.
Reviews / Votes
"This book is sunshine. A work of co-creation committed to destroying all forms of confinement, this powerful collection of critical essays, personal reflections, conversations, poetry, theater, art, war stories, love stories, and manifestos expose long-term caging for what it is: a drawn out execution. It also advances an abolitionist vision dedicated to interrogating and dismantling the institutions, practices, and ideologies that harm us, and imagining (and enacting) new ways of living, learning, and loving--new feminist freedoms. Inspiring, sobering, illuminating, terrifying, The Long Term, in other words, refers not just to the sentence but also to the struggle. As you read each page, remember that sunshine is life and power."?Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination
"The Long Term is a powerful collection of voices, curated and edited by a powerful line-up of veteran organizers and radical thinkers. The writers in this collection make a compelling and eloquent case against 'the prison nation' and give us a glimpse of the resistance and the alternatives that are already in the works."
?Barbara Ransby, historian, writer, activist and Distinguished Professor of African American Studies, Gender and Women's Studies, and History at the University of Illinois at Chicago
"The Long Term is a book for your favorite armchair: powerful reflections from the formerly incarcerated, the currently incarcerated, and those who work for their release from behind bars. From the front lines, it will inflame and inspire you to be part of this powerful wave of prison abolition and liberation."
?Bernardine Dohrn, co-author Race Course Against White Supremacy
"The essays collected in The Long Term address essential questions facing contemporary movements: "What must be transformed and built to eliminate harm, cultivate strong communities, and create forms of authentic public safety? What are the levers and the mind-sets that make prisons and policing appear logical, necessary, and possible?" This collection pulls together brilliant insights from writers inside and outside prisons, making critical insights and proposals about what it will take to get rid of police and prisons and build real safety and justice. This book is a must-read for anyone fighting against racism and criminalization. The Long Term is full of insightful, practical wisdom about how the punishment system is operating, what is fueling it, what reform attempts are inadvertently propping it up, and what kinds of work is actually necessary to abolish it. The Long Term is a bold and important contribution to feminist, anti-racist, and anti-punishment scholarship and activism."
?Dean Spade, founder of TORCH, Training and Organizing Resources for Community Health, author of Normal Life: Administrative Violence, Critical Trans Politics, and the Limits of Law
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Chicago
United States
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Unsewn / adhesive bound
Dimensions
Height: 213 mm
Width: 139 mm
Thickness: 30 mm
Weight
517 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-60846-899-7 (9781608468997)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
10/2018
Haymarket Books
€17.49
Available for download
Content
Table of Contents Section 1We Are AliveStories from inside/out of people serving long term sentencing and campaigns/struggles for liberation.1) Staying Alive Monica Cosby, formerly incarcerated mom, Mothers Against Violence and Incarceration 2) Death by Incarceration by Decarcerated PA3) Two TermsBenny Rio, incarcerated writer at Stateville, not yet confirmed4) Football Numbers Philip Hartsfield, incarcerated writer at Stateville5) Interviewwith Beth Richie + Albert WoodboxSection 2: Long Term Sentencing and the Illusion/Myths of SafetyTexts will sketch out the architecture of long term sentencing as a pillar of mass criminalization and incarceration1) The Truth about Truth In Sentencing by Joseph Dole2) Historical analysis of Long Term SentencingJames Kilgore3) Up Close and Personal:A Look at Women and Long-Term Prison SentencesCathy Boudine4)Conversation on the politics of being 'tough on crime'Dylan Rodriguez, Page May, Jason Perez5) Suspended: a science fiction futureKristina Colon, not yet confirmed6) Million Dollar blocks and Vacant NeighborhoodsRyan HollonSection 3: Liberatory Feminisms: Towards Dismantling White SupremacyA product of white supremacy and patriarchal frameworks, long term sentencing creates norms and shapes how we see ourselves and each other. This section critiques norms and imagines futures.1) Prison is Not FeministMairiame Kaba2) Collective Determinations: BYP100 and Fund Black FuturesJanae Bonsu3) Against carceral feminisms: why reversing the long term sentence is about rethinking responses to violence, including interpersonal violence and ending violence against "women and children"Deana Lewis and Rachel Caidor4) The Longest long-term: Aboriginal and Indigenous resistancesBoneta-Marie Mabo (Australia), Standing Rock image/Melanie Cervantes Digntade/Rebele, Naomi Moyer not yet confirmed.5)Gender non-conforming bodiesLiat Ben-Moshe in dialogue with Reina Gosset not yet confirmedSection 4: Long Term Resistance // Building Resistance for the Long Term1) Schooling and the Prison Industrial ComplexDave Stovall2) We Charge Genocide and the Homan Square campaignDamon Williams3) Organizing Ban the BoxVivian Nixon or Glen Martin not yet confirmed4) Lessons from All of Us or NoneLinda Evans5) Long term intergenerational strugglesLaura Whitehorn(New York?), Cara Page (New York), Debbie Kilroy (Australia Sisters Inside),Julia Whaipooti (New Zealand,JUSTspeak), Amanda George (Australia), INCITE, Rachel Herzing (CR, etc), Craig Gilmore (NYC), facilitated by Paula Austin or Bill Ayers (JILL) not yet confirmed6) Legacies of Margaret BurroughsEve Ewing, not yet confirmedSection 5: Litanies for SurvivalShort texts from writers in prison and families of incarcerated people. Recommend to dispersethese throughout the book.1) Five things I know I need to stay free for the long-term 250 words and images set up in an essay format: students at Sister Jean Adult High Schooledited and framed by Crystal Laura and/or Karen Reyes2) Survival strategies for siblingsMaya Schenwar, Elizabeth Brent3) Survival strategies insideby a woman writer inside, not yet confirmed Cedric Cal4) Survival strategies for parentsMary L Johnson, Armanda Shackelford. Robin Thompkins, the Cals, the Cunninghams, Sistas of the Hood, not yet confirmed.5) Father and Son insideKenneth + Michael Key (Sarah has asked, will follow up)