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"Can A Poem Stop A Jail From Being Built?" On Fugitive Counter-Ethics As Prison Pedagogy, Meghan Mcdowell, Alison Reed

Sociology & Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

(First paragraph) In 2016, we began facilitating a reading group at the Norfolk City Jail. Once a week during the semester, we met with six to eight men who qualified for "program privileges" and thus were given the option by jail staff to participate in the reading group. Each week we gathered to discuss the day's reading in what passed for a classroom inside the jail: a noisy corridor that connected two cellblocks. Against one wall there were four white picnic tables, bolted down to the floor, stacked one after the other. Though those accommodations were better suited for cafeteria-style …