Comments on: Prison Writing http://ajerk.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/prison-writing/ Short essays and petty insight. Sat, 28 Feb 2009 18:06:48 +0000 http://wordpress.com/ hourly 1 By: christy http://ajerk.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/prison-writing/#comment-13 christy Thu, 30 Nov 2006 03:41:46 +0000 http://ajerk.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/prison-writing/#comment-13 i like your approach, and your mode of thought, yet i would like to read this essay myself because maybe there are other points which need to be addressed. i also find that maybe the excersises put forth in her classes may not have been rehabilitating but possibly a form of escape and may not have had the specific agenda of making the women better people, but rather to show them that they too are human beings with a voice. maybe. furthermore, if you can touch at least one other life, that should still be considered extraordinary. i like your approach, and your mode of thought, yet i would like to read this essay myself because maybe there are other points which need to be addressed. i also find that maybe the excersises put forth in her classes may not have been rehabilitating but possibly a form of escape and may not have had the specific agenda of making the women better people, but rather to show them that they too are human beings with a voice. maybe. furthermore, if you can touch at least one other life, that should still be considered extraordinary.

]]> By: rebeca warkus http://ajerk.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/prison-writing/#comment-9 rebeca warkus Sat, 25 Nov 2006 02:35:51 +0000 http://ajerk.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/prison-writing/#comment-9 i write because i suck at english and other languages and if i dont do it ill probably give up of learning. im not sure if i understood you correctly but you plan on writing for the rest of your life. are you studying to become a journalist or smthg of that kind? i wouldnt trust any inmates because they were in touch with some sheets of paper and pencil. i write because i suck at english and other languages and if i dont do it ill probably give up of learning. im not sure if i understood you correctly but you plan on writing for the rest of your life. are you studying to become a journalist or smthg of that kind?
i wouldnt trust any inmates because they were in touch with some sheets of paper and pencil.

]]> By: Ryan Ryan http://ajerk.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/prison-writing/#comment-8 Ryan Ryan Sun, 19 Nov 2006 07:02:33 +0000 http://ajerk.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/prison-writing/#comment-8 <blockquote>This article has caused me to become very confused about what my job might be if I continue on in academics. What kind of impact can I possibly make? This article brought my hopes up for a brighter future of helping people and then threw them back onto the floor when I began to reflect on what was being left out.</blockquote> Everyone feels this way once in a while, we humans have a nice shield in front of our eyes most of the time that protects us from feeling so insignificant. Whenever I reflect and realize that my impact on the world will, even if I reach for my full potential, not likely be very large in the grand scheme of things, I remember that to stay sane in this world full of amazing things like freeways, aeroplanes, and dishwashers, we must focus the world down into a manageable size, and in that scale we can have quite an impact. I remember that in the list of things that are important to me, I can have an impact; if I can't have an impact any place then I find some place I can. <blockquote> She was very adamant throughout the article about how effective her classes were (because a few of the girls got published and so on) but did not talk about the majority of students in her classes. There were no statistics about how well her students did after they left the prison system. What happened to them? Why was there no follow up study? This makes her essay inconclusive in my eyes. She has a point that this sort of mental healing through creativity is effective, but what does it actually do if someone ends up back in prison? I would also have liked to know how much money was being spent on her class to begin with. Could that money have been spent in a different and more effective way?</blockquote> Isn't the study very recent? Perhaps no quantitative judgements about the effectiveness of the program at unlocking doors for these women could be done yet, hopefully there will be a follow up :) </blockquote>

This article has caused me to become very confused about what my job might be if I continue on in academics. What kind of impact can I possibly make? This article brought my hopes up for a brighter future of helping people and then threw them back onto the floor when I began to reflect on what was being left out.

Everyone feels this way once in a while, we humans have a nice shield in front of our eyes most of the time that protects us from feeling so insignificant. Whenever I reflect and realize that my impact on the world will, even if I reach for my full potential, not likely be very large in the grand scheme of things, I remember that to stay sane in this world full of amazing things like freeways, aeroplanes, and dishwashers, we must focus the world down into a manageable size, and in that scale we can have quite an impact. I remember that in the list of things that are important to me, I can have an impact; if I can’t have an impact any place then I find some place I can.

She was very adamant throughout the article about how effective her classes were (because a few of the girls got published and so on) but did not talk about the majority of students in her classes. There were no statistics about how well her students did after they left the prison system. What happened to them? Why was there no follow up study? This makes her essay inconclusive in my eyes. She has a point that this sort of mental healing through creativity is effective, but what does it actually do if someone ends up back in prison? I would also have liked to know how much money was being spent on her class to begin with. Could that money have been spent in a different and more effective way?

Isn’t the study very recent? Perhaps no quantitative judgements about the effectiveness of the program at unlocking doors for these women could be done yet, hopefully there will be a follow up :)

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