Unfreedom

Stacey Houston (George Mason University) has spent his career looking at the complex web between education, health, and the justice system. He says kids who interact in some way with the justice system—even if it’s just living near a justice system facility—have worse health and educational outcomes. Plus: The laws affecting indentured servants and enslaved people were constantly evolving during the earliest years of America. Allison Madar (Virginia Humanities) says the colonists had a culture of violence toward enslaved people and the laws they designed to control slaves also enhanced their power over women and mixed-race servants. Later in the show: Conversations about prison tend to focus on incarcerated men in urban areas. Bonnie Zare (Virginia Tech) takes us inside a rural Wyoming women’s prison to understand the experiences of what some women call “Camp Cupcake.”