courtesy Lyceum Agency
TV writer and producer Jenji Kohan adapted Piper Kerman’s memoir into an award-winning Netflix show.
of (connection to them), even though not everyone’s family has actually gone through the experience of incarceration. But you know, these questions bedevil every single community, and they’re very serious problems that confront us, in terms of substance-abuse disorder, in terms of violence between intimates—you know, almost all violence is between people who know each other—and in terms of mental illness. And the blunt truth is that prisons and jails are not good tools to fix those problems, and yet, that’s exactly what we task them to do. I think many people in this country, after 40 years of mass incarceration, are alert to the reality that what we’re doing currently is not working. People are interested in dialog, in learning more and talking more, and there is an increasing interest in holding the people who operate the criminal justice system more accountable. That’s sort of the ironic truth, that police and prosecutors and judges and correctional workers are often not accountable for what happens under their watch. We see that with police violence, we see that with false convictions, and we see that with some of the abuse that happens within prison walls. And I think there is an increasing call for people who we’ve endowed with a great amount of power over other people’s lives
to be more accountable and to make better choices themselves. … That kind of conversation needs to happen at the local level, at the city level, at the county level. That’s where the action is. A lot of your advocacy work has revolved around things like creative-writing programs for inmates. Why do you feel the arts are important to combat these problems? Well, there are several reasons. So yeah, I live in Ohio now, and I teach narrative nonfiction writing in two state prisons there: a men’s medium-security facility and the primary women’s prison in Ohio. And I do that because, first and foremost, I was so fortunate to be able to share my own story, and I think that we should have a lot more stories to really understand where we’re at. A single story could never explain something as complex as the American criminal justice system. But I think for that to happen, we really have to listen to the men, the women and the children— because we do lock up a lot of children in this country in the juvenile justice system. We really want to understand how are we at this point where we’re at. … These stories are fascinating and incredibly compelling, and some of them are funny, and some of them are, I can’t even tell you how heartbreaking. But when they learn how to tell their story in a way that is more easily understood by a wider number of people, I think that’s important for them, as well. I think my students start to recognize that their stories and their lives are important, and quite frankly, many of them, especially my female students, have been told their entire lives that their lives are not important. We’re talking about some of the most marginalized people in our communities, whether you’re talking about people of color, whether you’re talking about sex workers, whether you’re talking about mentally ill people or people with substance-abuse disorder. These are people we push to the margins of society. We tell them directly or we tell them with our actions that they’re not important. When my students get to tell their own story on their terms, they start to recognize the importance of their lives, and that’s a really important turning point for them to then have a greater sense of agency over their lives. I love this work. I’ve done it for almost four years now, and it’s one of the most important things I’ve ever done. The GJAC Creative Impact Luncheon is Thursday, Aug. 23, from noon to 1:30 p.m. at the Old Capitol Inn (226 N. State St.). Admission is $50 per person. Visit greaterjacksonartscouncil.com.
August 8 - 21, 2018 • jfp.ms
person, which is a reflection again of having a fortunately safe childhood and an education—there’s a reason I’m an optimist; I have reason to be optimistic. But I’ve been so encouraged. I’ve been to 48 states in this country now, and I’ve met people all over the country, and people are very interested in talking and thinking more about these questions because, of course, everyone has some sort
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