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Full-Text Articles in Social Justice

Prospective Hires: Examining Ex-Offender Stigma Effects On Employment, Amanda Neff Feb 2024

Prospective Hires: Examining Ex-Offender Stigma Effects On Employment, Amanda Neff

Justice Studies Theses

Formerly incarcerated persons face many barriers upon being released from prison–one of which is gaining employment. Obtaining a job can be difficult due to employers’ perceived employability of those who have been involved in the justice system. Organizational and personal characteristics of employers have been found in previous research to impact how likely an employer is to hire formerly incarcerated individuals. This thesis examines how stigma surrounding formerly incarcerated persons is perceived by employers through quantitatively examining employer demographics and their willingness to hire these individuals. This study used a mixed-model randomized sampling method for surveying employers in Bristol, Central …


“Social Workers By Day And Terrorists By Night?” Wounded Healers, Restorative Justice, And Ex-Prisoner Reentry, Allely Albert Oct 2023

“Social Workers By Day And Terrorists By Night?” Wounded Healers, Restorative Justice, And Ex-Prisoner Reentry, Allely Albert

Articles

Common to many post-conflict societies, former political prisoners and combatants in Northern Ireland are often portrayed as security threats rather than as potential contributors to societal peacebuilding processes. This distrust limits their ability to contribute to the transitional landscape and additionally hinders desistance processes during their reentry from prison. Drawing from the work of Maruna, LeBel, and others on “wounded healers,” this article critically examines the restorative justice work of ex-prisoners who have become involved in leadership roles within community based restorative justice. It is argued that such practitioner work can help former combatants overcome many of the challenges typically …


I Am Not Your Felon: Decoding The Trauma, Resilience, And Recovering Mothering Of Formerly Incarcerated Black Women, Jason M. Williams, Zoe Spencer, Sean K. Wilson Nov 2020

I Am Not Your Felon: Decoding The Trauma, Resilience, And Recovering Mothering Of Formerly Incarcerated Black Women, Jason M. Williams, Zoe Spencer, Sean K. Wilson

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Black women are increasingly targets of mass incarceration and reentry. Black feminist writers call attention to scholars’ need to intersectionalize analyses around how Black women interface with state systems and social institutions. This study foregrounds narratives from Black women to understand their plight while navigating reentry through a phenomenological approach. Through semi-structured interviews, narratives are analyzed using critical frameworks that authentically unearths the lived realities of participants. Themes reveal that for Black mothers, reentry can be just as criminalizing as engaging crime itself. These women face dire consequences around their mothering that induce them into tremendous bouts of trauma. Existing …


Reentry Court Judges: The Key To The Court, Christopher Salvatore, Venezia Michalsen, Caitlin Taylor Mar 2020

Reentry Court Judges: The Key To The Court, Christopher Salvatore, Venezia Michalsen, Caitlin Taylor

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Over the last few decades, treatment-oriented court judges have moved away from being neutral arbitrators in an adversarial court process to treatment facilitators. In the problem-solving court model, judges are part of a more therapeutic treatment process with program participants and a courtroom workgroup. The shift from the use of the traditional criminal justice process toward the use of more treatment-oriented models for some populations highlights the need to systematically document key elements of treatment court models. In particular, it is important to clearly document the role of Reentry Court Judges because they are a key component of the Reentry …


“It’S Hard Out Here If You’Re A Black Felon”: A Critical Examination Of Black Male Reentry, Jason M. Williams, Sean K. Wilson, Carrie Bergeson May 2019

“It’S Hard Out Here If You’Re A Black Felon”: A Critical Examination Of Black Male Reentry, Jason M. Williams, Sean K. Wilson, Carrie Bergeson

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Formerly incarcerated Black males face many barriers once they return to society after incarceration. Research has long established incarceration as a determinant of poor health and well-being. While research has shown that legally created barriers (e.g., employment, housing, and social services) are often a challenge post-incarceration, far less is known of Black male’s daily experiences of reentry. Utilizing critical ethnography and semi-structured interviews with formerly incarcerated Black males in a Northeastern community, this study examines the challenges Black males experience post-incarceration.


Race As A Carceral Terrain: Black Lives Matter Meets Reentry, Jason Williams May 2019

Race As A Carceral Terrain: Black Lives Matter Meets Reentry, Jason Williams

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

In the United States, racialized people are disproportionately selected for punishment. Examining punishment discourses intersectionally unearths profound, unequal distinctions when controlling for the variety of victims’ identities within the punishment regime. For example, trans women of color are likely to face the harshest of realities when confronted with the prospect of punishment. However, missing from much of the academic carceral literature is a critical perspective situated in racialized epistemic frameworks. If racialized individuals are more likely to be affected by punishment systems, then, certainly, they are the foremost experts on what those realities are like. The Black Lives Matter hashtag …