by Caroline M. Parker
University of Chicago Press, 2024
Cloth: 978-0-226-83621-8
Paper: 978-0-226-83623-2
eISBN: 978-0-226-83622-5 (all)
In Carceral Citizens, anthropologist Caroline M. Parker offers an ethnographic portrait of therapeutic communities in Puerto Rico, the oldest colony in the Americas. As nonprofits nested within the carceral state, therapeutic communities serve as reeducation and recovery centers for the mostly male drug offenders who serve out their sentences engaged in manual labor and prayer. The most surprising aspect of these centers, however, is that their “graduates” often remain long after the completion of their term, working as self-appointed peer counselors in a mixture of volunteer and low-wage positions.
Parker seeks to explain this dynamic by showing how, in these therapeutic communities, criminalized men find new and meaningful ways of living in the shadow of the prison. Through their participation in the day-to-day functioning of the centers, they discover and cultivate alternative forms of belonging, livelihood, and citizenship, despite living within the restrictions of the carceral state. Situating her study against the backdrop of Puerto Rico’s colonial history, and with findings that extend across Latin America, Parker challenges common assumptions about confinement, labor, and rehabilitation. By delving into lives shaped by the convergence of imperialism, the carceral state, and self-help, she offers a fresh understanding of the transformations of labor and social life brought about by mass incarceration.
“Overall, Carceral Citizens is an intellectually generative and significant work that effectively argues for a more complete understanding of the afterlives of incarceration in colonial times and beyond.”
— Alberto Ortiz Diaz, The Americas“The originality of Parker's work shines through as she highlights the profound contradictions that necessitate within its shadow for their own livelihoods. Parker deliberately situates her ethnography of pseudo-citizenship within a larger socio-historical context of progressions and regressions in US citizenship. In doing so, her work serves as a cautionary tale by reminding readers that hard-earned civil rights can turn out to be losable and temporary.”
— Michael Reyes Salas, Centro JournalLicense: CC BY-NC-ND
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