Schmidt 1

Emily Schmidt
ENG 123
Prof. Morris
Fall 2015
Annotated Bibliography

Cole, David. "Turning the Corner on Mass Incarceration?" Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law
2011. Print
This article talks about what the prison rates used to be and how much they have
increased today. It talks about how the United States had an average incarceration rate until one
year when it just shot up like crazy and has never came back down since then. The article talks
about how some places are starting to try other solutions instead of incarceration to try and limit
the amount of people who are incarcerated. The article briefly mentions how states want to make
it an easier transition from prison life to normal society. Hope that from that less people will end
up back behind bars for a second or third time. The article talks about how over the last 20 years,
crime in areas has gone down and this in return reduces the fear of the people living in specific
areas that are known for crime. The article also mentions the increase in the drug world. People
are becoming more involved in drugs and therefore suffer the consequences of using or selling
them.

Crutchfield, Robert D, and Gregory A Weeks. "The Effects of Mass Incarceration on

Communities of Color." Issues in Science and Technology Vol. 32.Issue 1 (2015):
P46-51. Print.
This article talks a lot about imprisonment with people of different nationalities. It talks
about how there are different races that have to people imprisoned than others. The article talks
about how African-Americans and Latinos are more likely to do things such as drug deals out in
public places. Obviously the police are going to be able to catch you easier if you do things like
that out in public. The second half of the article talks about Problems with the solutions. It
talks about how even though there are people who are trying to come up with solutions and ways
to make it better; there are still problems and things that are going wrong. One of the big
problems that they mentioned was inmates who have been released and now do not know how to
live in our society. For some, things have changed so much during the time that they were
imprisoned that now they do not know what the norms are in society. More than likely they have
very little money, and probably no home or family that is accepting of them. The last part of the

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article talks about what can be done and solutions to the problems that were supposed to be
solutions. Ultimately, the best way to reduce the collateral consequences and the criminogenic
effects of high rates of incarceration and their subsequent negative effects for communities of
color is to reduce the number of people going into prisons and to create a more just society.

Gopnik, Adam. "The Caging of America." The New Yorker. 30 Jan. 2012. Web. 8 Nov. 2015.
This article talks about what it is like for the life of a prisoner. The author of the article is
very clearly against the Mass Incarceration in the United States. It talks about the boredom inside
the prison is unreal and that it often feels like time does not move. It says that anyone who has
been in prison, even if it is just for a little while, will never forget the feeling of being all alone.
The article talks about how lifelong imprisonments in the United States are way harsher than the
same crime done in another country. It uses the example that Texas has 400 teens who are
serving life sentences. It talks about how if you are an African-American male who did not
graduate high school, your chances of going to prison are about 50 percent. The article makes a
comment on how there are more African-Americans imprisoned or on parole, than AfricanAmericans who were enslaved. The article mentions rape that happens in the prison and that
more than seventy thousand prisoners are raped each year. The author had very strong opinions
about what he believed and said, Since prison plays at best a small role in stopping even violent
crime, very few people, rich or poor, should be in prison for a nonviolent crime.

Gottschalk, Marie. The Prison and the Gallows: The Politics of Mass Incarceration in
America. New York: Cambridge UP, 2006. Print.
This book looked at different things that go along with mass incarceration in the United
States. The book mainly talks about four main points, those being; the victims' movement, the
women's movement, the prisoners' rights movement, and opponents of the death penalty. It talks
about each of those points and talks about the effect that each one has had. The book talks about
how much money go into all the prisons. With so many people incarcerated that means that a lot
of the governments money is going to have to go to the prisons to keep them up and running.
The book briefly talks about how some crimes that people are being put in prison for really are
not that bad. They may have broken the law, but does that mean they have to be incarcerated in a
government funded environment. The last thing this book touches on is the death penalty, talking
about the positives and negatives that come along with it. Gottschalk gives two reasons why she
believes that the United States should get rid of the death penalty. First, over time, several U.S.
states mounted strong movements for the abolition of the death penalty and, second, Europe did
not turn the death penalty into a human rights issue and adopt an uncompromisingly abolitionist
position until the 1980s.

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Harcourt, Bernard E. "Reducing Mass Incarceration: Lessons from the Deinstitutionalization of

Mental Hospitals in the 1960s." Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law 2011. Print
This article from the Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law talks a lot about what is was
like in mental institutions back in the 60s. It talks about President John F. Kennedy and how he
was going to try to reduce the number of people in custody by cutting the number in half. In
Harcourts article he gave three things to think about when talking about inquiry. He says, First,
with regard to the use of prescribed medications and other biological interventions, there is
certainly room for greater and improved psychiatric care and treatment of prison inmates.
Second, federal and state leadership could be encouraged to create federal funding incentives for
diversionary programs, reentry programs, and other ways of reintegrating offenders (or avoiding
incarceration from the outset) that would give states a financial motive to move prisoners out of
the penitentiary and into outpatient programs. Third, high-profile litigation of prison conditions,
of the paucity of mental health treatment, and of prison overcrowding, as well as documentaries
of prison life along the lines of Frederick Wisemans 1967 film Titicut Follies12 should form part
of a larger strategy to shift the public perception of those persons incarcerated. The article goes
on to talk about how people where imprisoned back in the early days of America.

Kaste, Martin. "Is It Possible To Let More People Out Of Prison, And Keep Crime Down?"
NPR. NPR, 16 July 2015. Web. 8 Nov. 2015.
This article talks about how the United States can keep the number of people incarcerated
down, but also keep crime down. The article opens by talking about nonviolent drug offenders
and how they are not really violent in the community. It gives the example of California reducing
the sentencing time of some inmates who were imprisoned for nonviolent crimes. They would
just come up to random prisoners on random days and say that they were leaving the next day
The article talks about how if they start to release people from prisons then if they get into
trouble again there are going to be those people who said I told you so. The article says that the
biggest thing holding back lightening sentences is police and other officials.

Lobuglio, Stefan F, and Anne Morrison Piehl. "Unwinding Mass Incarceration." Issues in
Science and Technology Vol. 32.Issue 1 (2015): P56-61. Print.
This article talks about the inmates involved in Mass Incarceration. It mentions how
because of a persons criminal record people are more likely not to hire them for a job. This

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makes it very hard for a person to come out of prison and try a start a new life, with no job or
money. Lobuglio talks about how he thinks that the United States should use a method that the
state of Massachusetts uses in that, criminal histories revealed to potential employers at 10
years for felony convictions and five years for misdemeanors. This would help an ex-inmate be
able to find a job sometime in the future. This article talks about how hard it is for the ex-inmates
to get back into society. A lot of times they end up back in bad neighborhoods and end up getting
in trouble with the law again. The article also talks about how expensive it is to fund a prison and
all the inmates. Unwinding mass incarceration requires much more than stopping current
practices or reversing course by mass commutations and early release programs.

Madar, Chase. "A Republican Against Prisons." The American Conservative. 3 Feb. 2015. Web.
8 Nov. 2015.
This article talks about how he United States has become too used to the idea of Mass
Incarceration. The article is a republicans stand on what they believe should be the way to deal
with the number of imprisoned people today. The article talks about how it is our whole nation
that is involved, but specifically the Southern states. The author of the article interviewed a
couple people and asked them different questions about mass incarceration, and why the prison
rate is so high in the United States. At the end of the article, the author says that it is not just
going to be one political party that changes everything; it is going to have to be everyone
agreeing on something together.

Pager, Devah. Marked; Race, Crime, and Finding Work in an Era of Mass Incarceration.
Chicago: U of Chicago, 2007. Print.
The book Marked focuses on the problems that inmates face after being released from
prisons. They are now left with this mark that will forever define who they are. The Book
especially focuses on people who are trying to get jobs, and having something on your criminal
record does not help a person get hired for a particular job. This causes some to end up going
back down the path that got them into trouble the first time. The book also mentioned that Pager
did a study that, sadly, it does matter your race when they are trying to find work. The study done
by Pager concluded that a white man straight of prison had the same chance as an AfricanAmerican man who had no criminal record. This makes it even harder for an African-American
man to try to reset his life with a fresh start. Pager also identifies three elements that foster
inequality in employment for ex-offenders: 1) selection effects assumes that employment
difficulties pre-exist incarceration; 2) transformation contends that the experience of
incarceration alters an individual in ways that prevent them from entering the labour market; and

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3) the stigma of incarceration amounts to a form of negative credentialing in a credential
society.

Patterson, Evelyn J, and Christopher Wildeman. "Mass Imprisonment and the Life Course
Revisited: Cumulative Years Spend Imprisoned and Marked for Working-age Black
and White Men." Social Science Research Vol. 53 (2015): P325-337. Print.
This article talks about the difference in white men verses African-American men. It talks
about how it is so much harder for an African-American man to adapt to life outside of prison
than it is for a white man. White men are unmarked at a quicker rate than the AfricanAmericans who are also marked. Something from this article that really got my attention was
the amount of time that a person is marked after being released from prison. The article that,
On average, white men spend on average 0.33 years imprisoned and 2.31 years marked.
Whereas for the African-Americans, on average, black men spend on average 1.79 years
imprisoned and 11.14 years marked. African-American men are marked a lot longer than the
average white man. This is a crazy stat that proves the point that whites and African-Americans
are not treated the same in the American society. The article also talks about the number of
African-American men who are imprisoned. The average African-American man spends about
one-seventh of their working life in prison. Plus, after getting out of prison the chance of getting
a job again is very low. People do not want to hire a person who has any sort of criminal record
behind them.

Petersilia, Joan. "Prisons Can Be Cages or Schools." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 16
Oct. 2005. Web. 8 Nov. 2015.
This article talks about education and how it is not very present in prisons. It says that
only one-third of all inmates receive educational training while in prison. It talks about how they
are all assigned different jobs, but a lot of the time the jobs do not benefit then in any way. This
article talks about how the inmates want these programs, but they are just not made available to
them most of the time. This article, like many of the others, talks about how inmates are not
ready to join the rest of society when they come out of prison because everyday life has changed
by the time they are released. They often find themselves back where they were before they went
to prison, and sadly end up being back behind bars again. The end of this article talks about how
something has to change. There has to be a system that can work to help these people who are in
prison or recently have been released from prison. Finally, it briefly mentions that criminals are

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not leaning anything in prison or are not likely to want to change their ways. They return to
society without a plan, without money, and without a good reputation.

Wyler, Grace. "The Mass Incarceration Problem in America | VICE News." VICE News RSS. 26
July 2014. Web. 8 Nov. 2015.
This article talks about the incarceration rate in the United States and how the number of
people imprisoned is up to about 2.4 million people. The article shows how states have more
people incarcerated than entire counties. It gives a good graph and pictures to help compare the
different states with different countries. The article goes on to talk about how the benefits of
mass incarceration really are not that great. Ex-prisoners get out and do not know how to
function in society. They cannot get a job, and have no money. To finish the article it talks about
how some states are funding prisons. At the state level, tight budgets have forced governors and
lawmakers to ease drug laws and relax harsh incarceration policies, and to look for more costeffective criminal justice solutions, including investing in better drug treatment and parole
programs.