Behind the razor wire: portrait of a contemporary American prison system

Abstract

More than a million Americans live in federal and state prisons, almost another half-million are in local gaols, and a third of the USA's young black men are involved in the criminal-justice system. To house the 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 the country's cultural and political landscape, the people in them - as well as the buildings themselves - remain hidden from public view. author of this book entered the prison system to record, through text and photographs, the voices and lives of the people who live and work within its walls. result is this examination of the physical and psychological environments of a range of contemporary correctional institutions and the lives they contain. foreword and essays by other contributors are severely critical of the American criminal-justice system and offer a framework for understanding the photographs in their historical and cultural context. Michael Jacobson-Hardy is also 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.