Exhibition & Events

Saturday, April 16, 2016

States of Incarceration National Conference Day 2

States of Incarceration
Time: 
9 AM to 5 PM
Venue: 

Arnhold Hall:
Theresa Lang Community & Student Center,
55 West 13th Street,
New York, NY

Description: 

States of Incarceration will bring together the national community of over 500 people in 20 cities who together created a traveling exhibition on the past, present, and future of mass incarceration.

Teams of students and people directly affected by incarceration from 20 cities each explores a history of incarceration in their own community, from Angola’s slave plantation-turned-prison in Louisiana, to the legacies of the Dakota Wars for Native American incarceration in Minnesota, to immigration detention at Ellis Island and Elizabeth, New Jersey. For its staging in New York City, the exhibit includes a focus on Rikers Island, developed by New School students in collaboration with The Fortune Society. The exhibition launches at the Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, Arnold and Sheila Aronson Galleries, at The New School April 3-21, 2016, before traveling to partner sites across the country.

The national exhibition launch events will bring together people who worked on the project from around the country to share local stories and open dialogue on national criminal justice reform.

9:00am - Welcome from David Van Zandt, President, The New School

9:20am - Framing the Forum

  • Heather Thompson, Professor of History, University of Michigan in Ann Arbor
  • Vivian Nixon, Executive Director, College and Community Fellowship (CCF)
  • Andrea Ritchie, Soros Justice Fellow

9:50am - Live Polling Session A

10:00am - Panel 1: Who works for prisons? Who do prisons work for?

  • Conversation: Taja-Nia Henderson, Associate Professor of Law, Rutgers University - Newark and Soffiyah Elijah, Executive Director, Correctional Association of New York
  • University of New Orleans | Windows on Angola Prison - Sentenced to Slavery, Stuck in Jim Crow?
  • University of North Carolina at Greensboro | Voices from the Chain Gang - What do we learn by listening?
  • Rutgers University, New Brunswick | Seabrook Farms and Labor - How is the racialized prisoner the ideal worker?
  • Arizona State University | The Cost of Immigrant Detention - How do profits shape punishment?

12:00pm - Interactive Feature

1:00pm - Panel 2: Where is the “Carceral State”?

  • Framer: Elizabeth Hinton, Assistant Professor of History and of African and African American Studies, Harvard University
  • The New School | Rikers Island, NY 11370: In Plain Sight - How do you see Rikers Island?
  • University of Texas at Austin | Spatial Stories of Migration and Detention - How does architecture shape punishment?
  • Skidmore College | Rehabilitating Dreams at Mount McGregor - What's lost -- and gained -- when a prison closes?
  • Vanderbilt University | Prison Profiteering in a Nuclear Shadow - Why do rural communities become prison towns?
  • Commentary: Ronald Day, Associate Vice President, David Rothenberg Center for Public Policy

3:00pm - Live Polling Session B

3:15pm - Breakout Session

4:15pm - Live Polling Session C

4:30pm - Share your take!

Time: 
9 AM to 5 PM
Venue: 

Arnhold Hall:
Theresa Lang Community & Student Center,
55 West 13th Street,
New York, NY