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Register below for access to screen The Prison in Twelve Landscapes, and instructions on how to join our virtual panel on August 20 from 7:00 to 8:30 p.m. EST.
A meditation on the prison's disappearance in the era of mass incarceration, The Prison in Twelve Landscapes unfolds as a journey through a series of ordinary places across the USA where prisons do work and affect lives: from a California mountainside where female prisoners fight the region's raging wildfires, to a congregation of chess players in Manhattan who did their time becoming masters of the game, to an Appalachian coal town betting its future on the promise of prison jobs.
The logics that underlie prisons and policing invade and mediate all of our social and interpersonal lives, and the impact of these systems are felt far and wide. Even where the prison itself is seemingly invisible, its shadow looms large.
Join us this Thursday, August 20 from 7:00 to 8:30 p.m. EST for "Casting Shadows: the prison in our daily lives." Scalawag will join the team behind the award winning documentary The Prison in Twelve Landscapes to discuss the film and the invisible effects of the prison industrial complex in Southern life—from environmental safety, to household goods, to economic development. We'll also talk about how we can end these harms through abolition.
"More people are imprisoned in the United States at this moment than in any other time or place in history, yet prisons have never felt further away or more out of sight."
Held as a part of Abolition Week, Scalawag's week of publishing work centered on the life-affirming and collective emancipatory project we know as Abolition, Thursday's virtual event will feature a panel discussion with the film's director and author Brett Story, and abolitionist and organizer Felicia Arriaga formerly of Durham Beyond Policing, a grassroots coalition to divest from policing and prisons and reinvest resources towards the health and wellbeing of Black and brown communities. The conversation will be moderated by Scalawag editor and prison abolitionist, Zaina Alsous.
Attendees will have the opportunity to ask panelists questions and break out into smaller facilitated groups to engage with one another and share about abolition efforts in their communities.
"The Prison in Twelve Landscapes excavates the hidden geographies of the modern prison system by offering a film about the prison in which we never see an actual penitentiary."
After you sign up for the event, in the confirmation email from Eventbrite you'll receive a custom link to watch the film The Prison in 12 Landscapes, along with a link to the Zoom call where the conversation will be held. The screening link will be live through the Q&A, giving plenty of time to watch the film beforehand.
To attend the conversation, make a suggested $5 dollar donation below. Your donation allows us to pay the panelists and to keep our content accessible for everyone. Attendance is free for Scalawag members and for those who have been incarcerated. Sign up for membership and get in free!