{"product_id":"captives-isbn-9781788739955","title":"Captives","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe definitive history of America’s most notorious jail and the violent rise of New York City’s law-and-order movement\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e combines a thrilling account of Rikers Island’s descent into infamy with a dramatic retelling of the last seventy years of New York politics from the vantage point of the city’s jails. It is the story of a crowded field of contending powers—city bureaucrats and unions, black power activists and guards, crooked cops and elected leaders—struggling for power and influence, a tale culminating in mass incarceration and the triumph of neoliberalism. It is a riveting chronicle of how the Rikers Island of today—and the social order it represents—came to be.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Conjuring sweeping cinematic vistas, \u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e records how the tempo of history was set by bloody and bruising clashes between guards and prisoners, between rank and filers and union bosses, between reformers and reactionaries, and between police officers and virtually everyone else. Written by a one-time Rikers prisoner, \u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e draws on extensive archival research, decades of journalism, interviews, prisoner testimonials, and firsthand experience to deliver an urgent intervention into our national discussion about the future of mass incarceration and the call to abolish prisons. The contentious debate about the future of the Rikers Island penal colony rolls onward, and \u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e is a must-read for anyone interested in the island and what it represents.“Rikers Island has the same relationship to New York as his picture did to Dorian Gray in the famous story by Oscar Wilde: the notorious super-jail is the grotesque face of the institutional cruelty and racism that lies behind so much of the Big Apple’s preening dazzle. Shanahan, who personally experienced Rikers’ violence, has crafted a masterpiece of synthesized social observation, analytic history and political critique. Now that the city has a new mayor who loudly champions the jailers and bad cops, \u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e is urgent and obligatory reading.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Mike Davis, author of \u003ci\u003eCity of Quartz\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003ePlanet of Slums\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Shanahan’s lively must-read explains the power politics shaping New York City’s municipal lockup frenzy.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Ruth Wilson Gilmore, author of \u003ci\u003eAbolition Geography \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eGolden Gulag\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eCaptives \u003c\/i\u003ereveals the long history of racial oppression and unaccountable violence in the Rikers Island jail complex that has been hidden in plain sight … This extraordinary book demonstrates the centrality of jails to life in New York City.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Matthew Lassiter, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Silent Majority\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e is more than a history of the notorious Rikers Island; it is a riveting, caged bird’s-eye view of the tumultuous shift from postwar liberal dreams of penal reform to neoliberal punishment, police power, and the rise of the carceral state. Ultimately, it is a book about class struggle—how we got from ‘build better’ to ‘lock ’em up’ to ‘shut it down.’”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Robin D. G. Kelley, author of \u003ci\u003eThelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eCaptives \u003c\/i\u003eis an important and timely book that vividly depicts how decades of class struggle and oppression, especially along the lines of race and gender, shaped the rise of Rikers Island as we know it today. A must read!”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Silvia Federici, author of \u003ci\u003eCaliban and the Witch\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “\u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e is an amazingly detailed journey into a New York City jails system fueled by capitalist greed, political expediency, and racist exploitation. Conditions have deteriorated on Rikers Island even compared to the oppressive and inhumane environment that I experienced detained as a 16-year-old member of the New York Panther 21. Jarrod Shanahan’s incisive history challenges us to thought and action. The longer Rikers stays open and the push for new carceral facilities continues, the longer our collective humanity remains caged.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Jamal Joseph, author of \u003ci\u003ePanther Baby: A Life of Rebellion and Reinvention\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e is a long, hard look at the role of human cages within New York City politics and the reform efforts that birthed Rikers. His account reads like a page out of \u003ci\u003eL.A. Confidential\u003c\/i\u003e rewritten with corrupt guards in place of cops, from an unaccounted $2 million discovered posthumously in the safe of the guards’ union president to rebel prisoners at the Manhattan Tombs hanging burning sheets out of windows.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Abby Cunniff, \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Shanahan makes it possible to answer the immediate and pressing question-why did an agenda of jail reform fail so drastically, producing in the process one of the most notorious penal colonies in the United States?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Kay Gabriel, \u003ci\u003eNation\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “A scrupulously researched history showing nearly a century of dysfunction of one of the world’s largest correctional institutions. And the inescapable conclusion that, whatever the justice is in shipping people to Rikers, there is little justice once they arrive.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Jacqueline Cutler, \u003ci\u003eNew York Daily News\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “A vivid, vital, and terrifying volume.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Scott Stern, \u003ci\u003eJacobin\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “\u003ci\u003eCaptives\u003c\/i\u003e is a vivid, disturbing, and timely chronicle of New York’s long crisis.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—David Helps, \u003ci\u003eMetropole\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eJarrod Shanahan\u003c\/b\u003e is a writer, activist, and educator based in Chicago. He works as an Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice at Governors State University in University Park, Illinois, and is the coauthor of \u003ci\u003eStates of Incarceration: Rebellion, Reform, and the Future of America’s Punishment System\u003c\/i\u003e; a co-editor of \u003ci\u003eTreason to Whiteness Is Loyalty to Humanity\u003c\/i\u003e, a Noel Ignatiev reader; and an editor of \u003ci\u003eHard Crackers: Chronicles of Everyday Life\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Verso","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302717280485,"sku":"NP9781788739955","price":29.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781788739955.jpg?v=1767723386","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/captives-isbn-9781788739955","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}