Prison Life

Piper Kerman, a freelance producer living in New York City with her boyfriend, was incarcerated in 2004 for money laundering and drug trafficking. She tells this story in her memoir, Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison. Kerman tells her audience about her escapades in her twenties, and her normal life afterwards. But one day she is greeted with two police officers at her door, and things go downhill from there. Kerman is later arrested after a very lengthy court case and taken to federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut. Kerman makes light of her year spent in prison, writing about the different people she met and the experiences she had. Overall, Kerman’s memoir is an easy and fun read

Orange is the New Black illustrates the corrupt and dysfunctional nature that has manifested through the American prison system via Piper Kerman’s pivotal personal experience of living in a women’s prison for a year.

Piper Kerman offers to her readers an interesting story about life in prison in her book Orange is the New Black. One might be confused with such statement, as there is not much exciting happens in prison and to write an interesting book based on one year of confinement seems to be an impossible task. However, Kerman’s work appeals to much deeper topics than just a physical process of imprisonment or everyday routine of convicts. Being a memoir, Orange is the New Black provides personal insights of the author concerning the prison system in the United States, freedom, and experiences of women who happened to be behind the bars. Kerman seeks to encourage people to think about the necessity of criminal justice reform, particularly in respect

“Prison is not an isolated institution, it is part of a continuum in the control of women, whether by our lack of access to economic independence, violence, racism or specific laws that target women such as prostitution and social security. The society that condemns the behavior of women it imprisons, yet accepts the treatment prisoners are given inside is at best hypocritical, but perhaps more correctly, sadistic” (Amanda George). The prison system takes people away from their families and communities, for petty crimes and then give harsh sentences that doesn’t match the crime that was committed. Women are placed in an oppressive and controlling environment which subjects them to be treated in a manner which society looks down on but accept and sadly, does nothing about. Correspondingly, Piper Kerman wrote a memoir “Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison”

According to the Criminal Code of Canada, life imprisonment is the mandatory sentence pertaining to high treason or first-degree murder and second-degree murder. It is said

‘Most of the participants said they had felt involved and committed. The research had felt "real" to them. One guard said, "I was surprised at myself. I made them call each other names and clean the toilets out with their bare hands. I practically considered the prisoners cattle and I kept thinking I had to watch out for them in case

Orange is The New Black is a new and innovative series aired on Netflix that follows the life of Piper Chapman, played by Taylor Schilling. Chapman was sentenced to fifteen months and serves her prison term at Litchfield Correctional Facility. She acquired the charge of criminal conspiracy after transporting a suitcase full of drug money to her then drug-running girlfriend Alex Vause, who is portrayed by Laura Prepon. Piper’s decade-old crime finally caught up to her. She has to give up her upper-class routine and her fiancé Larry, portrayed by Jason Biggs, for an orange jumpsuit and the new prison environment she was hoping to elude. The series follows Chapman’s unique experiences inside the prison, explores her interactions with other inmates and shows her animosity towards her ex-girlfriend Alex who happens to be in the same prison.

With this scenario I would describe the traditional sentences as one to five years in jail since it is a federal crime and it is her second offense to it but it also depends on the amount of marijuana she was dealing. With this scenario also the children does tie into this by protective services or Department of Social Services will be called and the children will be taken away to either be placed into foster homes or given to other family members. Now an alternative sentence for this scenario is paying a fine between $200 and $5,000 with no jail time. Another alternative would be giving the defendant an opportunity to get a job skill from a trade school so “she” can get a decent paying job to support herself and her two small children. With a history

The speech I attended was a panel of women who had all previously been to prison. This panel was particularly interesting because these women were the inspiration for the television series Orange is the New Black. The Netflix original series is based on Piper Kerman’s book of the same name. The book was based on her experience in the women’s prison Danbury, which is located in Connecticut. Piper wrote about her personal story and the stories of many of the women she interacted with. Several of these very women came to Suffolk University to give a talk on their own personal experience in the prison system and their thoughts on the television series.

Orange is the new black is a show that basis women's views from a prison who are not terrible people however they ended up doing something if not for themselves but for someone else that gets them in trouble with the law. Necessarily wasn't the best idea or the right thing to do. The women are viewed as being strong or weak emotionally independent, dependent.

What is the expectation when someone commits a crime? Many would say that offenders require strict punishment including harsh sentencing moreover that rehabilitation is without value. Two conflicting views are being examined from Eugene H. Methvin, who is a supporter of mandatory sentencing as well as ‘three strikes’ sentencing that can result in life sentences being mandatory for repeat offenders even if they are non-violent crimes. On the other hand, is David Shichor, who supports sentencing that is efficient and fair especially since harsh sentencing does not reduce crime. Two works are reviewed, Eugene Methvin is his paper Mugged by Reality and David Shichor in his Three Strikes as a Public Policy.

Orange is the New Black, a comedy drama TV show that first aired on Netflix is 2013, follows Piper Chapman on her journey through an all women’s minimum security prison. The show is critically acclaimed due to the wide expanse of topics it covers. Not only is it taking on the topic of female prisoners in the United States prison systems and its accomplishments and flaws, it focuses on the female inmates and their backgrounds. The show touches various subjects such as sexual orientation, gender, race, and religion. There are inmates of all races and ethnicities and various different religions are portrayed, such as Catholicism, Buddhism, and Wicken. There are heterosexual, bisexual and homosexual inmates. There is one inmate that

The US prison system is famous for its notorious inefficiency. While not being the largest nation in the world, America has the largest prisoner population, surpassing countries such as India, Russia, and China in both inmate population rates and numbers of inmates per 100,000 people. As it stands, there are over 2,100,000 incarcerated prisoners, with over 7 million being supervised as part of their probation period (World Prison Brief, 2015). According to McLaughlin, Pettus-Davis, Brown, Veeh, and Renn (2016), the total burden on the US economy for maintaining the prison system, including the social costs, exceeds 1 trillion dollars a year. US prison population began growing exponentially ever since the adoption of the so-called “War on Drugs” policy, declared by President Nixon in 1971, which was an attempt to curb the flow of drugs flowing into the country through the Mexican border. While this effort proved to be a failure on its own, it also significantly contributed to the increase of prisoner population in the US.

Orange is the New Black by Jenji Kohan has been streaming on Netflix since July 2013 by the production company Lionsgate Television. The television show is about the main character Piper Chapman who just got in jail. She is serving time at Litchfield Penitentiary, a federal prison for women in upstate New York, for drug smuggling with her ex-girlfriend (Alex) a couple of years ago. When Chapman goes to prison she is reunited with Alex, even though their relationship goes through ups and downs as the time goes by. The main focus of the television show is to present a public discourse about the criminal justice system, particularly incarceration in the United States. Through the social cognitive theory and the agenda setting theory one is able to see how Orange is the New Black draws attention to different issues within our incarceration system, specially imprisonment of women. From the social cognitive theory aspect,the filmmaker has communicated an acceptance towards distinctive identities by having a variety of characters in the show. Apart from this, agenda setting theory comes into play when particular issues within imprisonment are presented, like solitary confinement was throughout many episodes. These can be further examined and analyzed looking at all the elements Jenji Kohan implements in her scripts to open up a public discussions about social issues.

A hard line stance by law enforcement to treat addiction with a criminal justice approach rather than with a public health approach has resulted in over-crowded prisons and offenders in need of treatment. The rise of the prison population began with enactment of the federal Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 (Olson & Lurigio, 2014). Highlighting the escalating prison population, Olson and Lurigio (2014) noted from 1990-2000 the state prison population had almost doubled. Additionally, Taxman, Perdoni, and Caudy (2013) indicated of the approximate 7 million adults being supervised by the United States correctional system, almost 70% have been diagnosed with a substance use