The Power of Story: From Hearing Incarcerated Voices To Changing The Justice System
Stories move us as human beings. In the United States, over 2.3 million (2,300,000) people can tell detailed stories of state and private run correctional facilities. These people are forced to live in tiny cells or crammed into packed room within jails, prisons, and detention centers across the country. Some of them have done bad things. Some of them have made mistakes. Some have been victims of mistaken identity, or falsified circumstance. Regardless of the reasons people end up stuck behind bars, research on the consequences of prison and jail time for inmates is disheartening, tragic, and demands change.
During a two-year thesis project as a grad student (2013–2015) and a thirteen-month internship with The Incarcerated Voices Project (2014–2015), I listened to over a hundred (about 115) first-hand stories from individuals across the United States who were currently or previously incarcerated. Most of these stories were shared via letters sent to the Incarcerated Voices Project from jails and prisons that participated in the program, but I also recruited currently free, previously incarcerated individuals for in person interviews and…