Social Stratification in the Deep South

Dear Summer Class:

This is Prof. Earl Smith.

This is my last blog (or close to my last blog):

Prisoners: Those persons (male, female, youth etc) confined to an institution (including home arrest) for reasons that they have been convicted & sentenced to a specified sentence (overall time of confinement).

Prisons: The actual place of confinement. Confusion arises when delineating a prison from a jail, from a state institution, from a federal institution. For simplicity sake a prison (qua jail) is the place convicted persons are sent to serve out their time. New to the US Justice System is the SUPERMAX PRISON. Here we have an institution (many located underground) whose sole purpose is holding the most hardened criminals in the US, many of who will never leave the SUPERMAX alive

Corrections: The treatment of offenders through a system of penal incarceration, rehabilitation, probation, and parole, or the administrative system by which these are effectuated. the department of local government that is responsible for managing the treatment of convicted offenders.

Parchman (a Mississippi State Penitentiary) is an older type of prison whose existence is built around the style and structure of the “plantation.” Hence, prisoners being held there, for the most part, carry out old style farming. Many of the farm staple goods are consumed by the inmates (beans, corn, okra, etc).

Since about the 1970s we see in the US an increase in male and female incarceration. With the change in the drug laws (most infamous are those applied in New York State under the administration of Gov. Nelson Rockefeller), more and more US citizens (and so-called illegal aliens) begin serving longer and longer sentences for violating drug laws. These lead to the now controversial “3-strikes you are out” felony convictions whereby a third felony conviction can mean life imprisonment regardless of what that 3^rd felony is. E.g., people can now go to prison for life for three drug convictions. Many crime scholars argue that these people have nothing more than a drug problem (a medical issue) and they are being WARE HOUSED in American prisons.

Important to prisons like Parchman is the issue of privatization. Although the state of Mississippi is still considering making Parchman a private prison, in the 1970s private corporations began to purchase and run American prisons. The significance of this is that prisoners are now laborers in many of these private prisons and they produce products that are purchased in the “free world.” Mostly they work for private global corporations (e.g., McDonald’s, Microsoft, Vitoria Secret, IBM etc).

At Parchman, although not a private penal institution, the production of the commodity cat fish is organized as a private production, distribution crop and sold on the world market. The cat fish industry is so lucrative for Parchman that it has knocked out of competition many of the previously successful cat fish farms in the Deep South, including Mississippi.

Hence, prisoners, prisons and corrections remain central to the study of social stratification not only in the south of the US but worldwide.

It used to be, but is no longer the case, that you could teach a social stratification course (outside of the standard criminology courses) and never have to include in the syllabus anything on the penal system. This is no longer the case.

The course was great. Have a wonderful summer.

NEWS BLAST FROM PARCHMAN

On this 20,000 acre prison farm it is routine to hear that no one escapes. It is not routine to hear that VIOLENCE is a daily occurrence. A week before our visit to Parchman (June 5, 2007) a murder took place and our visit was almost cancelled.

This morning, I am receiving information from Dr. Luther Brown (Delta Center, Cleveland State University in Cleveland Mississippi) that a few days after we visited Parchman there was an escape of an inmate working in the hospital unit (now you know why we insisted that there be no tank tops, no colored shoe laces, pull your pants up and, as we were told in the “pre-release unit” in our discussion with the two inmates - DON’T LET ANYONE PASS ANYTHING TO YOU. All of these rules are important in a place like Parchman). A few days later an inmate committed suicide (he hung himself) in Unit #32 (the unit we saw in the electronic TV monitoring room).

It is always good, about this time in the course, to head to New Orleans. As my co-instructor Dr. Angela Hattery and I say “New Orleans comes at the right time.” Since this is the 3^rd iteration of the Deep South summer course, nothing has changed this time around.

After two intense days in Hancock County (working at the library there), all of us need the break. Our assignments — after listening to staff and county officials tell us (in general) about the impact of Katrina-brought us closer to the aftermath of the hurricane. The students in the class got the chance to do oral histories with several library staff and one journalist (the journalist Mr. Al Showers taped interviews with our students).

The intensity of the interviews and stress of the library staff (many who lost all they owned, including homes, valuables, family members etc) came to a head in a series of back and forth commentaries between the class and library staff. We feel this is a good thing as both, staff & students developed a deeper understanding of loss and a better understanding of sociological analysis. Please read the blogs and comments.

We arrived in New Orleans around 3pm. When the bus stopped at the hotel (Royal St. Charles) we parked in the same spot as last time and the same problem ensued: the trolley car could not get pass the bus!

Students have assignments -from examining biographies of famous people in the Deep South to demographic research on counties in the state of Mississippi (specifically the Gulf coast and the Delta region).

My early morning walk in New Orleans took in the usual: night lifers struggling to their hotels (I did not spot our students) to seeing an accident where a SUV was on its roof to helping two young women opening the SUBWAY parallel park their car and, finally, seeing an old Wake colleague Dr. Tony Marsh (Health and Exercise Sciences) at MOTHERS restaurant.

We are off to ACORN for a lecture (an NGO that works on housing and voter registration) and then we tour the 9^th ward.

Have a great day.

Earl Smith

Sociologists have been studying disasters (natural and “man” made), but without much fanfare. In fact, back in 1972 one of the worst disasters took place in a small coal mining town. Here is a description:

The Buffalo Creek Flood was an accident that occurred on February 26, 1972 when a coal slurry impoundment dam built on a hillside in Logan County, West Virginia by the Pittston Coal Company burst. The resulting flood unleashed approximately 132 million gallons (500,000,000 L) of black waste water upon the residents of 16 coal mining communities in Buffalo Creek Hollow. Out of a population of 5,000 people, 125 people were killed, 1,121 were injured, and over 4,000 were left homeless. The incident completely leveled the town of Saunders, W.V. (the current town of Saunders is not the same one that once was located in Buffalo Creek).

Sociologist Kai Erickson wrote a book about it that is still worth reading. His work, an analysis of the effects of the disaster on the Buffalo Creek community entitled Everything In Its Path. The book later went on to win the Sorokin Award, an accolade handed out by the American Sociological Association for “outstanding contribution to the progress of sociology.”
Similarly, sociologist Adeline G. Levine wrote a book (LOVE CANAL) about another disaster that took place in the upstate New York community known as Love Canal. It is a neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York. Unlike the Buffalo Creek disaster, Love Canal was the result of deliberate chemical dumping in the Niagara River by the corporate chemical company Hooker Chemical and Plastics. The human damage was horrific. Birth deaths and cancer were discovered to be the outcome of the toxic dumping.

I mention these two examples from the sociological literature because I wonder who will write the definitive study of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Can someone write this study?

From what we heard and saw yesterday, I doubt it. The destruction from Katrina in Bay St. Louis and Waveland Mississippi is incomprehensible. The death. The destruction of homes, schools, businesses, libraries and bridges can not be imagined. These forms of destruction can not even become movies.

Listening to the Hancock Library staff introduce us to our Service Learning Project not only brought many questions from the class but also tears. The bus tour of Bay St. Louis and Waveland was quiet. Other than our tour guide no one spoke. You could hear gasps only; all of us were stunned.

Hence, our first day in Bay St. Louis was a tough one. This morning we will conduct several service learning projects. We will build scrap books, scan documents and take oral histories. All of these projects were suggested to us via Dr. Lynn Sutton our Director of Z. Smith Reynolds Library. Her international work on the board of a major consortium of libraries brought this possibility to my attention early 2007. The students are “pumped” about the projects as are the staff traveling with us.

The students participating in the oral history project took Institutional Review Board (IRB) training in the spring to obtain certification necessary for working with human subjects (most groaned about the task)!

Later today I will report on how we did this morning.
Have a great day.
Earl Smith

We left the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC; located in Montgomery, Alabama) after a discussion of “hate” in the south. Lilly Massa (Wake alum, now a staff member at Vanderbily U) met us there and after our discussion with Andrew who explained how the SPLC works, the types of cases they engage in and the most recent cases they are involved with, we hit the L O N G road to Mississippi.

Must also say here WELCOME to Prof. Susan Faust (Wake Forest, Dept. of Communication) who arrived late the previous evening.

Thanks to Dr. Lynn Sutton (Director of the Z. Smith Reynolds Library at Wake Forest) we are committed to 2 1/2 days of “service” at the Hancock County library. Our students completed the required Institutional Review Board certification (a 4 hour ordeal) so that they can take oral histories from people directely impacted from Hurricane Katrina.

Along with the oral histories we will also engage a team of students with building a “paper trail” of the hurricane and the devestation via scrapbooks. The class has been split up into 2 (maybe 3) groups with specific tasks.

To prepare for the folks in Hnacock County we watched on the bus a CNN video of what Katrina did to this part of Mississippi (near the Gulf).

Most consistently the people talked about not getting the “respect & attention” as did New Orleans. They also did not get the financial response from US insurance companies, even those few with the proper insurance.

I am looking forward to our time here as it will give the class an “up front” experience working with good people who were hit with a natural disaster and who have had to navigate the human response (and not just FEEMA).

Check out the FLICKR (photographs) from the last few days. Some awesome graphics from our crossing the bridge coming into Selma.

Also, even though the Internet connections have been less than desirable, our students have done their homework, wrote their blogs, placed them on flass drives and thanks to Susan S. Smith (Director of Technology at the Z. Smith Reynolds Library, Wake Forest U) we have been able to get the info on-line.

Part 2 of this blog with be posted later tonight.

Have a great day,

Earl Smith

In preparing for our trip to Montgomery we attended the 10:45am service at the historic 16th Street Baptist Church.

The audience, service, signing, the band and, of course, the Preacher were terrific.

Many in our group are not Baptist and when we talked about the service on the bus it became apparent this was the case.

Since sociology is about observation, the two hour service was incredible.

The sermon was about “not quitting.” It started very low key, the preacher talked about Paul, and ended talking about the sins of homosexuality, poverty, unhealthy marriages and not skipping church for Memorial Day BBQ.

Because of some very heavy eating for the last two days, we decided to pick up food and simply eat in. Ronnie stopped at Wal*Mart (which caused some concern for those who do not shop at Wal*Mart).

The evening at the Embassy Suites was LOUD (mostly our students).

Today (Memorial Day) we dive into some demographics of Birmingham and Montgomery. We will examine contemporary issues related to poverty, access to health care, schooling in todays society in these important cities.

This is where we part from the history perspective/discipline. The students will have assignments that they will then discuss & post to the WIKI. We want our students to engage history but move forward to what is happening today and then ask questions about “SOCIAL PROGRESS.”

We are off to visit the Selma to Montgomery Trail and afterwards we will have a BBQ, a reflection to remember the troops and get to work on the assignments.

ES

Saturday was a long but adventursome day. We started the day hoping to enter the 16th street Baptist church. Several students reported on the church, the four girls killed but when we arrived downtown the shurch was closed.

We received conflicting information about why the church was closed but in the end it seems that Mr. Green, someone we have gotten to know over the years is now ill. He works at both the Civil Rights Museum but is also the “keeper” at the church.

When we met with Ms. Peggy Heidi, Ms. Barbara Shores and Judge Helen Shores Lee, each in their own way did mention the significance of the church. Hopefull, we will be able to attend services there on Sunday.

Although I have heard the stories of these extraordinary citizens of Birmingham it is exciliarating to hear from them again. They tell a story that is not found in the history books.

The visit to “dynamite hill” is always important. On the bus I asked several students how it would feel to wake up and then go to sleep again after your house was bombed. They just looked at me without answering.

The home visit with the lady across the street from Prof. Angela Davis home was just great. The interwoving story of purchasing the home (in a white neighborhood, the street split the races) and living there with white mobs wanting to buy them out I think gave the students an up close view of what it was like in the real world of Birmingham in the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s. She remembered us from the last visit two years ago.

Cameron Cole, a Wake alum, had some of his friends meet us at the Dreamland BBQ joint. Our class seemed to be so happy there, talking with each other about the day. We placed selected students around the tabless to make sure that we, at day 2, got everyone properly introduced to each other.

A long day, but important towards getting the course off the ground.

Mr. Ingramm led the end of day reflections and from all accounts these are going well.

Today (Sunday) we are headed to Montgomery? We will attend 16th Street Baptist church this morning, do some shopping later and several students and Ronnie (our bus driver) are wanting to watch the big NASCAR race later today. We also pick up Kendra at the airport as she is flying in from Atlanta after attending a family members wedding.

See ya,

Earl Smith

Hello:

We had a 10 hour ride to Birmingham. While LONG, it was educational to hear the student reports and listen (and contribute) to the discussions of (a) social stratification and (b) what defines a southerner.

Many of the students from the south (even though their parents are from elsewhere) did not define themselves as “southerners.”

Everyone on the bus enjoyed the chapter by Dr. Escott.

We arrived at the hotel (Comfort Inn, Birmingham), checked in and within 90 minutes we were headed to the restaurant (Irondale Cafe’) a small, intimate place where the movie FRIED GREEN TOMATOES was filmed.

The food was OK. Cheap.

That ended day one.

Todat, 9AM we are having a tutorial session by Susan Smith and Lynn Sutton (Z Smith Reynolds Library). Everyone is listening and paying attention.

At 10AM we are off to downtown Birmingham to see sites and visit with public officials who are taking time from their Memorial Day weekend to visit with the class.

See ya,

Earl Smith

Dear Strat Class:

Less than one week from today we are off to Birmingham.

While this week has been Very hectic (making hotel reservations, contacting our contacts, making sure we have a day to day schedule, etc) and losing two or three of the students who originally signed up for the course, I do feel we are ready.

Any last minute details will be worked out over the weekend.

Please remember to re-visit the packing list, locate your essentials (charger cords, ID’s of somce sort, adequate suit cases etc., and, most of all start reading.

Please look for the course syllabus, the first reading assignment on Monday.

Have a great graduation weekend,

Sincerely,

Earl Smith

Welcome to the Deep South Summer course. We are about to hit the road.