VOLUME 20, NUMBER 1 (2011) is a special issue of the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons edited by Jennifer M. Kilty.
For many years, the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons (JPP) has been a prisoner-written, academically oriented and peer-reviewed non-profit journal based on the tradition of the penal press. JPP brings the knowledge produced by prison writers together with academic arguments to enlighten public discourse about the current state of carceral institutions. This is particularly important because, with few exceptions, definitions of deviance and constructions of those participating in these defined acts are incompletely created by social scientists, media representatives, politicians and individuals in the legal community.
These analyses most often promote self-serving interests, omit the voices of those most affected and facilitate repressive and reactionary penal policies and practices. As a result, the JPP attempts to acknowledge the accounts, experiences and criticisms of the criminalized by providing an educational forum where women and men can participate in the development of research that concerns them directly. In an age where “crime” has become lucrative and exploitable, the JPP exists as an important alternate source of information that competes with popularly held stereotypes and misconceptions about those who are currently, or who have in the past, faced the deprivation of liberty.

Jennifer M. Kilty is Associate Professor of Criminology at the University of Ottawa. The author of numerous articles and chapters, Dr. Kilty is co-editor of Demarginalizing Voices: Commitment, Emotion, and Action in Qualitative Research (2014).

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