ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors attempt an analysis using the race/class and gender paradigm first proposed by African American women. They conduct a study in a mid-sized city in the Southeast in 2008 in which they interviewed 25 men and three women returning from prison. The authors undertook the challenge to change the debate on black families as "fragile families" as a consequence of cultural factors inherent within African American Civil Society. The familial collateral damage growing from mass incarceration on the African American Family is hard to capture in a brief but suffice to say that this familial collateral damage can be seen and felt in several different ways by African American families and their communities. The majority of drug offenders who are sentenced to prison are never provided treatment. The authors acknowledge the need to support children of incarcerated parents. There are pilot programs that provide children the opportunity to visit their parents, mostly mothers, in prison.
