Life Beside Bars: Confinement and Capital in an American Prison TownBy HeathPearson, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2024. 240 pp. ISBN: 978‐1‐4780‐3114‐7
Year: 2025
Type: book-review
Abstract: Prison is often imagined as separate from mainstream society, as a world unto itself with its own social systems and power structures fundamentally different from those of "normal people".On the contrary, prisons are firmly woven into societal attitudes about law and order, as well as the political and economic forces that shape our lives and discourse.A prime example of this is Cumberland County, New Jersey, a place with a long history of ethnic cleansing, slave labor, illegal internment, and mass incarceration that molds it to this day.In his new book, Life Beside Bars, author Heath Pearson attempts an ambitious ethnography of this troubled town.Unfortunately, this analysis falls short of its full potential, becoming too opinionated to truly shine as it could and should.
Source: The Journal of American Culture
DOI: 10.1111/jacc.13626
Author: Zachary Kizer
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W4410905219