Introduction -- Mean lives: a theoretical framework -- Mean laws: the rise in female imprisonment -- "Mean women" or "mean lives"?: adverse childhood experiences and adult abuse of women prisoners -- The prison experience -- Going back again by Juanita Ortiz -- Coming home and staying out -- The children and their caregivers -- Winds of change -- Lessons learned and moving forward
Summary
Oklahoma has long held the dubious honor of having the highest female incarceration rate in the country, nearly twice the national average. In this compelling new book, sociologist Susan Sharp sets out to discover just what has gone so wrong in the state of Oklahoma-and what that might tell us about trends in female incarceration nationwide. The culmination of over a decade of original research, Mean Lives, Mean Laws exposes a Kafkaesque criminal justice system, one that has no problem with treating women as collateral damage in the War on Drugs or with stripping female prisoners of their
