I had to put together a short list of useful readings about the current criminalization of youth (particularly black and brown youth) in the U.S. for one of my former students.

I think that some of these readings might be of interest to readers of this blog so I am sharing them here. There are a mix of academic and popular articles and essays. The list is not exhaustive but I have used these texts in my teaching and have found them very good.

L. Janelle Dance (2002) Fear of the Dark: the Villification of Urban Students in Tough Fronts: The Impact of Street Culture on Schooling. [This chapter explains how racial stereotyping negatively impacts young black men. Essential reading to understand the symbolic violence that many urban (black and brown) students have to overcome.]

Bernadine Dohrn (2000) “Look Out, Kid, It’s Something You Did:” The Criminalization of Children in The Public Assault on America’s Children: Poverty, Violence and Juvenile Injustice. Edited by Valerie Polakow. [This essay is a must read to understand the evolution of zero tolerance policies. Bernadine does a great job of clearly laying out how youth have been increasingly criminalized in multiple contexts including in schools, the child welfare system, the courts, etc…]

Henry A. Giroux (2009) Locked Up: Education and the Youth Crime Complex in Youth in a Suspect Society: Democracy or Disposability. [This chapter is not an easy read but it is essential to understanding the process of the school to prison pipeline. Giroux does a terrific job of explaining the genesis of the ‘punishing state’ and how this intersects with the institution of schooling.]

Lynnell Hancock (2000) Framing Children in the News: The Face and Color of Youth Crime in America in The Public Assault on America’s Children: Poverty, Violence and Juvenile Injustice. Edited by Valerie Polakow. [This essay takes on the news media and its role in shaping the public’s fear of children (particularly black and brown youth). Hancock squarely addresses the role of race and racism in media coverage about youth.]

Paul Hirschfield (2008) Preparing for Prison: The Criminalization of School Discipline in the USA in Theoretical Criminology. [Paul and I went to graduate school together but this is not why I am recommending this excellent article. He does a masterful job of laying out the evolution of zero tolerance policies and places these policies within a historical and sociological context. A must-read for those who want to have a better understanding of the context for the modern emergence of the school to prison pipeline.]

William Julius Wilson (2008) The Economic Plight of Inner-City Black Males in Against the Wall: Poor, Young, Black, and Male. Edited by Elijah Anderson. [I am including this essay on this list because I think that it does a very good job of explaining the impact that deindustrialization has had on communities of color in the U.S. I do not think that one can understand the criminalization of black and brown young people without assessing the impact that unemployment and a lack of economic opportunities has had on them.]

Chicago Reporter Series About Youth Tried and Sentenced as Adults: Stolen Futures.