ABSTRACT

I am talking to educators about the school to jail “pipeline.” It is a hot September day and folks are fanning themselves with my handout. A woman is visibly sleeping in the third row.

I sketch for the audience how schools facilitate the movement of youth of color into more punitive institutions such as prisons. I don’t feel as if I have the audience-they are drifting. It is the weather, or perhaps it is because I am talking right after lunch. At the end of my talk I offer a short discussion about the concept of prison abolition and people visibly perk up. I talk about how the relationships between schools and jails moved me to consider the concept of prison abolition, or imagining worlds without prisons. I am careful to say that for me abolition does not mean opening the doors to San Quentin tomorrow, although I do not state that I am not certain this is such a bad idea, but rather I want to work toward reducing my, and my communities’, dependence on police, surveillance, and other punitive structures.