Behind the Razor Wire: Portrait of a Contemporary American Prison System - Hardcover

Jacobson-Hardy, Michael

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0814742408 ISBN 13: 9780814742402

Publisher: NYU Press, 1998

Synopsis

More than one million Americans live in federal and state prisons and close to another half million are in local jails. One out of every three young black men is involved in the criminal justice system. To house our ever increasing prison population, the construction of new prisons has become a growth industry in many local and state economies. Yet while prisons are a rapidly expanding feature of America's cultural and political landscape, the people in them, as well as the buildings themselves, remain hidden from public consciousness. Determined to break this silence, Michael Jacobson-Hardy entered the prison system to record the voices and the lives of the people who live and work within its walls.
Behind the Razor Wire continues the tradition of documentary photography by reporting in words and photographs on the conditions in the American prison system. Jacobson-Hardy examines the physical and psychological environments of a range of contemporary correctional institutions and the lives they contain. The foreword by Angela Y. Davis and essays by John Edgar Wideman, Marc Mauer, and James Gilligan, MD make a searing indictment of America's criminal justice system, while offering a framework for understanding the photographs in their historical and cultural context. By recording the faces, the emotions, and the lives of those who live and work in the prison system, Jacobson-Hardy heightens public awareness and promotes dialogue on criminal justice policy.
Behind the Razor Wire creates a visual portrait of prisons and prisoners, and a compelling documentary of how prisoners see themselves and of how in turn they are seen by others.

About this title

About the Author

Michael Jacobson-Hardy is the author of The Changing Landscape of Labor: American Workers and Workplaces. His photographs have been exhibited widely and are included in many public and private collections, including the Smithsonian Institution, the Henry Ford Museum, the Yale University Art Gallery, and the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University.

Edition details

• Publisher: NYU Press
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0814742408
• ISBN 13: 9780814742402
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 1