More handpicked essays just for you.
Brief look into incarceration
Racial discrimination in the united states criminal justice system
Cultural and racial differences in america
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Reading this chapter and thinking about how my childhood compared to what the book defines how the African American community is really is discouraging. Throughout my life everyone in my community played a role in how I am and became successful. The more I read this book I become
The major role played by African American women in the reconstruction era is revised and illustrated in Tera W. Hunter’s To Joy my Freedom and Elsa Barkley Brown’s article Negotiating and Transforming the Public Sphere: African American Political Life in the Transition from Slavery to Freedom. Both documents analyze the participation and involvement of black women in social and political activities inside of their communities. To Joy my freedom, written by Tera W. Hunter provides an inner look into the lives and strives of African American women – mainly working class – living in Atlanta between the eighteenth and nineteenth century, in the middle of one of the most belligerent environments created in the era of Reconstruction.
Will society ever view African-Americans as people and not as less than? In “Chokehold” Paul Butler will discuss this very idea depth. Butler provides history on why and how society sees African-American men as violent thugs. Butler goes on to explain in detail how the chokehold plays a part in oppressing African-American men and how to avoid the ramifications of the Chokehold, if possible.
In eleven states, at least 1 in 20 black adults are in prison. Research shows that prosecutors are twice as likely to pursue a mandatory minimum sentence for black people as for white people charged with the same crime. One in nine black children and one in 38 Latino children have an incarcerated parent, compared to one in 57 white children.
Thirdly, when it comes to structural connections between young and black individuals it is based on the way capitalism has changed the world. Corporations are focusing on maximizing their profits to the fullest while ignoring the state’s laws. The conditions of working in such companies resemble slavery such as barely making minimum wage and unjust treatment of its workers. Thus Davis notes it is important that society does not shun the need to talk about
Abstract: This paper provides an introduction to the social impact of the collateral consequences (the families left behind) of mass incarceration. The reading will include thoughts from sociological perspectives and empirical studies that focus on the consequences incarceration and re-entry have on the striving family left behind. Partners and families of felons suffer from the system in place that punishes, rather than “corrects,” criminal behavior. Collateral Consequences Patience Kabwasa Prof. Laura Howe Soc 231-C21 May 1, 2014 Collateral Consequences
This week, the readings point the spotlight at the some of the depressing hardships that the African-American population frequently experience. In “Naughty by Nature”, Ann Ferguson covers the different perceptions that society has of colored boys. David Knight’s work “Don’t tell young black males that they are endangered” seeks to explain the differents outcomes of African-American youth that arise when society constantly oppresses them. The last article by Carla O’Connor, “The Culture of Black Femininity and School Success”, focuses on the image of African-American woman that is created as a result of them attempting to preserve in a system that opposes them.
Is it fair that an African American man is sentenced up to life in prison for possession of drugs when Brock Turner is sentenced to only 14 years, later to be reduced to six months for sexually assaulting an unconscious women. The judiciary system are believed to have a high african american incarceration rate as a result of discrimination. At a presidential debate on Martin Luther King Day, President Barack Obama said that “Blacks and whites are arrested at very different rates, are convicted at very different rates, and receive very different sentences… for the same crime.” Hillary Clinton said the “disgrace of a criminal-justice system that incarcerates so many more african americans proportionately than whites.”
African Americans face a struggle with racism which has been present in our country before the Civil War began in 1861. America still faces racism today however, around the 1920’s the daily life of an African American slowly began to improve. Thus, this time period was known by many, as the “Negro Fad” (O’Neill). The quality of life and freedom of African Americans that lived in the United States was constantly evolving and never completely considered ‘equal’. From being enslaved, to fighting for their freedom, African Americans were greatly changing the status quo and beginning to make their mark in the United States.
Michelle Alexander, similarly, points out the same truth that African American men are targeted substantially by the criminal justice system due to the long history leading to racial bias and mass incarceration within her text “The New Jim Crow”. Both Martin Luther King Jr.’s and Michelle Alexander’s text exhibit the brutality and social injustice that the African American community experiences, which ultimately expedites the mass incarceration of African American men, reflecting the current flawed prison system in the U.S. The American prison system is flawed in numerous ways as both King and Alexander points out. A significant flaw that was identified is the injustice of specifically targeting African American men for crimes due to the racial stereotypes formed as a result of racial formation. Racial formation is the accumulation of racial identities and categories that are formed, reconstructed, and abrogated throughout history.
Slavery, Jim Crow, the ghetto, and the carceral apparatus are all structural institutions that share a mutual beneficial relationship where each has supplemented and historically progressed into more advanced subtle forms of oppression and racism. Past and current regimes served as social functions with the objective of encompassing African Americans in a permanent subordinate position. In each generation, newer developments of a racial caste emerge with the same objective of repudiating African Americans citizenship. The only thing that has changed since Jim Crow is the language we use to justify racial exclusion (Alexander, 2). These four regimes are genealogically linked because they all advanced and developed from one another.
The Huffington Post says, “The U.S. incarcerates nearly seven times as many people, measured as a share of population, as Canada does. People of color are disproportionately represented in the American prison population and are typically punished more severely than white peers for the same crimes” (Daniel Marans). Racism against people of color has caused them to be represented poorly in society as potential criminals, especially black. MIT informs its viewers that “according to the United States census Bureau, blacks are twice as likely to be poor compared to other races, and eight times as likely to be imprisoned. Blacks are also three times more likely to be convicted of drug violations than whites.
However, racial bias also plays a role in the juvenile justice system. When looking at the population of detention centers and training schools, black males are four times more at risk of being a part of this population than white males are (Leiber & Fix, 2019). Going back to the 1990s, 41% of juveniles in detention centers were black (Leiber & Fix, 2019). In 1995, 68% of the detention centers population was made up of minorities (Leiber & Fix, 2019). These juveniles who were minorities were also more likely to be sent to an adult court (Leiber & Fix, 2019).
There are many open wounds in the African-American community that have not healed what so ever. Disintegration of family structures in the African-American community has been a persistent problem for far too long. High out of wedlock birth rates, absent fathers, and the lack of a family support network for many young African-Americans have led to serious problems in America's urban areas. The persistence of serious social problems in inner-city areas has led to a tragic perpetuation of racial prejudice as well. African Americans still face a litany of problems in the 21st century today.
Slavery, the War on Black Family While slavery in America was an institution that was started over 400 years ago, the affects were so horrific that it is still felt today by modern day African Americans. Many families had to deal with the constant stress of being sold which made it difficult to have a normal family life. Slaves were sold to pay off debts, an owner dying and his slaves were sold in an estate sale, or when an owner’s children would leave the home to begin a life of their own, they would take slaves with them. Often times, children were not raised by their parents, other family members of someone designated to watch the children because the mother and father had to work long hours and the children were too young to join them.
