Description
Book SynopsisTrade Review“Humanizing and nuanced . . . [Ortiz’s] overarching approach, centered on human action, agency and (self-)determination, will inspire many with its obvious relevance to the present and future of mass incarceration. In this vital and public-facing conversation, Ortiz’s voice and scholarship will undoubtedly be not only welcome, but essential.” * Social History of Medicine *
“
Raising the Living Dead makes an excellent case for a new wave of scholarship on the history of crime and punishment. It builds on the existing literature then applies an innovative multiperspectival approach grounded in theory and rich primary sources.” -- Julia E. Rodriguez, University of New Hampshire
“This is at once a deeply personal project for the author and a penetrating and nuanced analysis of prison reform and rehabilitation policies in a society caught in between—between imperial projects (declining Spain and rising US), between cultures (Spanish and Anglo-American), between races (‘white’ to ‘black’), and between carceral systems (dungeon to rehabilitative institution). By diving into a rich trove of individual and institutional records, Ortiz Díaz has produced a multifaceted understanding of efforts to change the way punishment worked in Puerto Rico in the second quarter of the twentieth century.” -- Thomas Holloway, University of California, Davis
“Through meticulous archival research, Ortiz Díaz has rediscovered a surprising and overlooked era of prison reform in mid-twentieth-century Puerto Rico. Defying the stereotype of the exclusively passive or resistant colonial subject, inmates were active participants in the rehabilitation of their bodies, minds, and social identities.
Raising the Living Dead constitutes an important and innovative contribution to the new and vibrant field of international prison history.” -- Mary Gibson, John Jay College and the Graduate Center, City University of New York
Table of ContentsPreface
Introduction: Toward a Holistic History of Incarceration
1 Under a Microscope: Convict Bodies and Prison Biomedicine
2 To Classify and Treat: Correctional Psychology and Psychiatry
3 Interactional Care: Social Workers, Parole Officers, and Social Rehabilitation
4 More Than Flesh: Sacred Knowledge and Experiential Healing
5 In Pursuit of Awakening: Carceral Therapeutic Humanities
6 Health Activism: Executive Clemency on the Mona Passage
Conclusion: A Rehabilitative Dream Turned Punitive Nightmare
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index
