This section of the website includes essays that explore the history of prisons, with a focus on some of the ethical questions that have been at the center of many of the debates, including abolitionism, prison reform movements, and medical experimentation in prisons.
N. Keegan, “Literally and Figuratively: The Use of Literalism and Moral Debate in Pro-Slavery and Abolitionist Interpretations of the Bible in the American South, 1840-1860” – read the essay.
Comer Wadzeck, “Beccaria, Bentham, and the Intellectual Seeds of a Carceral State” – read the essay.
Nathaniel Flores, “Eastern State Penitentiary: A “Progressive” Prison?” – read the essay.
Natalie Riddick, “War Rationale: Prison Experiments in Germany and the United States During WW II” – read the essay.
Featured Image: Eastern State Penitentiary, lithography of its radial plan, by P.S. Duval and Co., 1855. Image Source: Mike Graham from Portland, USA – Flickr, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1146578
