Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2025

Publication Title

Contemporary Justice Review

Keywords

carceral care, alternative education, carceral citizenship, racial capitalism, youth justice

Abstract

Drawing on in-depth interviews with current and former students, parents, teachers, and staff members connected with three alternative schools in one Kentucky, USA school district, this work contributes to the theorization of carceral care. Instead of reducing the alternative school, its processes, and its functions down into a dichotomized question of good or bad, productive or violent, we come to see the dialectical nature of carcerality and the logics of care. Specifically, the negative consequences that students are subjected to are justified and internalized by the (perverse) benefits of attendance, thus dissipating from the realm of critique. As such, I conclude by arguing that without disciplinary alternative schools, we might be forced to reckon with the slow violence of crowded classrooms, whitewashed curriculum, undervalued teachers, underfunded supportive services, and bloated security/surveillance apparatuses – and with that, the system of racial capitalism that it props up.

Funding Source

This article was published Open Access thanks to a transformative agreement between Milner Library and Taylor & Francis.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

DOI

10.1080/10282580.2025.2546810

Comments

First published in Contemporary Justice Review (2025): https://doi.org/10.1080/10282580.2025.2546810

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