Law Societies & Justice Department – 91 News /news Wed, 09 Jul 2025 16:52:45 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 ‘Ways of Knowing’ Episode 4: Global Disability Studies /news/2025/06/03/ways-of-knowing-episode-4-global-disability-studies/ Tue, 03 Jun 2025 17:55:51 +0000 /news/?p=88228 Since 2014, The European Union has been crafting policy on the rights of disabled people with “independent living” as a key element. Officials noticed the law wasn’t being followed in countries like Malta, so they moved these young people into their own apartments. But these were pretty much the only people in their 20s who weren’t still living at home.

Ways of Knowing

The World According to Sound

Season 2, Episode 4

Global Disability Studies

[background music plays]

Voiceover: “The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities commits both the E.U. and all of its member states to realizing the right of persons with disabilities to live independently in the community.”

CH: Since 2014, The European Union has been crafting policy on the rights of disabled people. A pillar of that policy: the idea of “independent living.”

Voiceover: “To ensure that the right of people with disabilities to live independently and be included in the community”

CH: A noble idea: just because you’re differently abled, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be able to participate fully in your community. So every country in the E.U. is supposed to uphold these rights. If you’re disabled and living at home with your parents, or living in institutional housing, you have the right to your own apartment — your own, independent living situation.

[background music plays]

CH: But then an interesting thing happened. In Malta, a small country just south of Sicily in the Mediterranean Sea, E.U. officials noticed that this law wasn’t being followed. Most young people with disabilities were still living at home with their parents. So the officials, upholding the law, moved these young people into their own apartments. The thing is, these were pretty much the only young people who had their own apartments in all of Malta. People in their 20s who were not differently abled still lived at home.

Stephen Meyers: And so you have this like complete, this kind of ideology about you’re emancipated, you’re no longer disabled once you can live by yourself. But that’s weird in the rest of the world.

CH: Stephen Meyers, professor of international studies as well as law, societies and justice at the 91.

SM: But for most people in the world, they live in interdependent relationships, right? You have multi-generational families, people live in that family from birth to death. And that’s for everyone, not just for persons with disabilities.

CH: It’s normal in Malta, just like a lot of other countries, to live with your family until you’re married. So being off on your own and living independently, disabled or not, doesn’t make sense there.

SM: And so you think about kind of the hallmarks of what it meant to be like everyone else in Britain or the United States, which would be like you own your own home or your own apartment, you have a job that you can compete for against others and you can do your job, you can use the bus like everybody else. These are the measures and can we have equal access to these kinds of things? You lift that up and try to plunk it down in another place and that starts coming apart.

CH: For Stephen, this highlights a major issue in the field of disability studies: Western bias.

SM: So disability studies is about advancing disability rights. You’re going in and trying to use it to change places. But if we don’t understand those places, then we aren’t necessarily creating positive change.

CH: In Germany, France, the U.K. … living an independent, emancipated life is seen as an objectively good thing. It’s not. It’s a cultural construct.

SM: The particular Western experience of disablement –– and it’s even narrower than that; it’s really the kind of middle class, white, majority culture, Anglo experience –– has really defined how we think about disablement and how we think about what we call disability emancipation. So through rights would be the Western understanding that we are no longer disabled by society.

CH: Western bias is foundational to the entire field of disability studies. It was there from the beginning. Addressing this bias requires an understanding of the historical roots of the discipline.

SM: Disability studies really began in the U.K. and in the United States. It has a particular history that I think you can look at the founders who were very concerned with things like institutionalization and didn’t go out in society. You could spend your entire life in a home or a nursing home.

CH: Disability studies challenged this practice. It said that there are lots of problems with institutionalization, that it degrades those who are in it and that it leads its participants to lives of total dependency. So disability studies offered something else: independence.

SM: People were very concerned with this idea of independence, right? So you’re put in an institution, you’re dependent upon the institution, you can’t do anything for yourself. And so, much of the advocacy was to create opportunities for independent living. That became the framework: To be disabled meant to be robbed of your independence.

[background music plays]

CH: At the time, shifting focus from dependent, institutionalized living to independence was a radical shift in Western thought around disability. But as we saw with the Malta example, this major tenet of disability studies was problematic. It just couldn’t account for all the cultural differences around the world. Other disciplines in American academia, like English, history, or philosophy, have been grappling with their Western biases for decades. But it’s taken pretty much until now –– in the 2020s –– for disability studies to come to terms with this.

SM: Disability studies is quite late to kind of decolonizing. Many disciplines have been working hard to say, “OK, what are the voices we’ve silenced? What are ways in which we’ve presented non-Western spaces in kind of stereotyped ways?” Anthropology has been doing the work, history has been doing the work, sociology has been doing the work. But disability studies has not been doing the work. We think of ourselves as a critical discipline, like we’re already critiquing society. So when you’re critiquing society, you oftentimes don’t think about critiquing yourself and the ways in which you’re actually doing some of the things that you see in others. I think as a discipline it’s done a very poor job thinking about how we include voices from outside of the West, and how when our theories, our methods, our research kind of gets exported, how do we make sure we aren’t mischaracterizing the experience of people in those other places, right?

[background music plays]

SM: We want as many people included as possible. You know, you think about the social sciences or the humanities or disciplines at-large, it’s about human experience. If you have a discipline that is narrowly defined then you’re only able to capture one experience, and you exclude all the others, right? If you limit that then you’re really failing.

CH: Here are five sources that will help you learn more about global disability studies.

“Disability, Globalization and Human Rights,” edited by Hisayo Katsui and Shuaib Chalklen

CH: This book is a good introduction to how disability is treated differently around the world, and makes a case for universal disability rights.

“Decolonising disability: thinking and acting globally,” by Helen Meekosha.

CH: A paper that argues how the dominance of the global North in writing about disability has resulted in the marginalisation of these experiences in the global South.

“Global Perspectives on Disability Activism and Advocacy,” edited by Karen Soldatic and Kelley Johnson

CH: This work explores the diverse ways in which disability activism and advocacy are experienced and practiced by people with disabilities and their allies.

“Decolonising Eurocentric disability studies: why colonialism matters in the disability and global South debate,” by Shaun Grech

CH: This book traces the relatively recent use of the term “colonize” in disability studies, and argues that the field must continue to use it if it wants to be taken seriously.

“Engaging with Disability with Postcolonial Theory,” by Anita Ghai.

CH: This article looks at how disability is viewed in India, and tries to assimilate postcolonial thought into the field of disability studies.

CREDITS

Ways of Knowing is a production of The World According to Sound. This season is about the different interpretative and analytical methods in the humanities. It was made in collaboration with the 91 and its College of Arts & Sciences. All the interviews with 91 faculty were conducted on campus in Seattle. Music provided by Ketsa, Human Gazpacho, Graffiti Mechanism, Serge Quadrado, Bio Unit, and our friends, Matmos.

The World According to Sound is made by Chris Hoff and Sam Harnett.

Stephen Meyers

This is an example of Western bias in disability studies, says , a 91 associate professor of law, societies and justice and of international studies. In this episode, Meyers discusses how this bias is foundational to disability studies, and how the field won’t advance until it works to critique itself.

This is the fourth episode of Season 2 of “Ways of Knowing,” a podcast highlighting how studies of the humanities can reflect everyday life. Through a partnership between The World According to Sound and the 91, each episode features a faculty member from the 91 College of Arts & Sciences, the work that inspires them, and suggested resources for learning more about the topic.

Next | Episode 5: Abstract Pattern Recognition, or Math

]]> ArtSci Roundup: June 2025 /news/2025/05/23/artsci-roundup-june-2025/ Fri, 23 May 2025 21:35:36 +0000 /news/?p=88071

From campus to wherever you call home, we welcome you to learn from and connect with the College of Arts & Sciences community through public events spanning the arts, humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences. We hope to see you this June.

ArtSci on the Go

Looking for more ways to get more out of Arts & Sciences? Check out these resources to take ArtSci wherever you go!

Zev J. Handel, “Chinese Characters Across Asia: How the Chinese Script Came to Write Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese”()

Black Composers Project engages the School of Music faculty and students ()

Ladino Day Interview with Leigh Bardugo & MELC Professor Canan Bolel ()

Back to School Podcast with Liz Copland ()

Featured Podcast: “Ways of Knowing” (College of Arts & Sciences)

This podcast highlights how studies of the humanities can reflect everyday life. Through a partnership between and the 91, each episode features a faculty member from the 91 College of Arts & Sciences, who discusses the work that inspires them and suggests resources to learn more about the topic.

Episode 1: Digital Humanities with assistant professor of English and data science, Anna Preus.

Episode 2: Paratext with associate professor of French, Richard Watts.

Episode 3: Ge’ez withassociate professor of Middle Eastern languages and cultures, Hamza Zafer.

Closing Exhibits

: Christine Sun Kim: Ghost(ed) Notes at the Henry Art Gallery

Week of June 2

Prof. Daniel Bessner

Monday, June 2, 5:00 – 6:20 pm | ONLINE ONLY: (Jackson School)

Join the Jackson School for Trump in the World 2.0, a series of talks and discussions on the international impact of the second Trump presidency.

This week: Daniel Bessner; Anne H.H. and Kenneth B. Pyle Associate Professor in American Foreign Policy at the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies.

Monday, June 2, 5:00 – 7:00 pm | (Jackson School)

Mediha Sorma, Ph.D

This talk discusses the unconventional forms of care that emerge out of Kurdish resistance in Turkey, where mothering becomes a powerful response against necropolitical state violence. By centering the stories of two Kurdish mothers who had to care for their dead children and mother beyond life under the violent state of emergency regime declared in 2015; the talk examines how Kurdish mothers “rescue the dead” (Antoon, 2021) from the necropolitical state and create their necropolitical power through a radical embrace of death and decoupling of mothering from the corporeal link between the mother and the child.

Monday, June 2, 3:30 – 5:00 pm | (The Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies)

Prof. Masaaki Higashijima

Why do some protests in autocracies attract popular participation while others do not? Masaaki Higashijima’s, University of Tokyo, paper argues that when opposition elites and the masses have divergent motivations for protesting, anti-regime mobilization struggles to gain momentum. Moreover, this weak elite-mass linkage is further exacerbated when autocrats selectively repress protests led by opposition elites while making concessions to those organized by ordinary citizens.

 

Tuesday, June 3, 5:00 – 6:30 pm | (Communications)

Mary Gates Hall

A conversation with local public media leaders about current challenges–including federal funding cuts–and pathways forward for sustaining public service journalism.

Speakers include:

Rob Dunlop, President and CEO, Cascade PBS
David Fischer, President and General Manager, KNKX
Tina Pamintuan, incoming President and CEO, KUOW
Matthew Powers, Professor and Co-Director, Center for Journalism, Media and Democracy

Wednesday, June 4, 3:30 – 4:30 pm | (Psychology)

Prof. Hadas Okon-Singer

Cognitive biases — such as attentional biases toward aversive cues, distorted expectations of negative events, and biased interpretations of ambiguity — are central features of many forms of psychopathology. Gaining a deeper understanding of the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying these biases is crucial for advancing theoretical models and clinical interventions.

In this talk, Prof. Hadas Okon-Singer will present a series of studies exploring emotional biases in both healthy individuals and participants diagnosed with social anxiety, major depressive disorder, and generalized anxiety disorder.

Wednesday, June 4, 12:30 – 1:30 pm | (Center for Statistics & Social Sciences)

Prof. Tyler McCormick

Many statistical analyses, in both observational data and randomized control trials, ask: how does the outcome of interest vary with combinations of observable covariates? How do various drug combinations affect health outcomes, or how does technology adoption depend on incentives and demographics? Tyler McCormick’s, Professor, Statistics & Sociology, 91, goal is to partition this factorial space into “pools” of covariate combinations where the outcome differs across the pools (but not within a pool).

Friday, June 6, 7:30 pm | (School of Music)

David Alexander Rahbee leads the 91 Symphony in a program of concerto excerpts by York Bowen, Keiko Abe, and Camille Saint-Saëns, performed with winners of the 2024-25 School of Music Concerto Competitions: Flora Cummings, viola; Kaisho Barnhill, marimba; and Sandy Huang, piano. Also on the program, works by Mikhail Glinka, Richard Wagner, and Giuseppe Verdi.

Saturday, June 7 & Sunday, June 8, 10:00 am – 5:00 pm | (Burke Museum)

Artist Stewart Wong

Stewart Wong will share knowledge and personal experiences about working with Broussonetia Papyrifera. He will talk about the history, uses, and cultivation of the paper mulberry plant. In addition, Stewart plans on dyeing, drawing on, and printing kapa. Stewart will have printed information and material samples to supplement the talk.

Saturday, June 7, 11:00 am – 12:00 pm | On Our Terms with Wakulima USA (Burke Museum)

Join the Burke Museum for a short screening from “,” plus a conversation with co-producer Aaron McCanna and Wakulima USA’s David Bulindah and Maura Kizito about food sovereignty and community building.

Additional Events

June 2 | (Music)

June 2 | (Asian Languages & Literature)

June 2 – June 6 | (Astronomy)

June 3 | (Music)

June 4 | (Music)

June 4 | (Psychology)

June 5 | (Music)

June 5 | (Speech & Hearing)

June 5 | (Labor Studies)

June 5 | (Art + Art History + Design)

June 6 | (Dance)

June 6 | (Geography)

June 7 | (Music)

Week of June 9

Wednesday, June 11 to Friday, June 27 | (Jacob Lawrence Gallery)

At the end of the spring quarter, the academic year culminates in comprehensive exhibitions of design work created by graduating students. The 91 Design Show 2025, showcasing the capstone projects of graduating BDes students, will be held from June 11 to June 27 in the Jacob Lawrence Gallery.

Additional Events

June 11 | (Henry Art Gallery)

June 11 | (Art + Art History + Design)

June 12 & June 13 | (DXARTS)

June 13 | (Art + Art History + Design)

Events for the week of June 23

June 24 | (Information Sessions)

June 25 | (Information Sessions)

June 26 | (Information Sessions)

June 27 | (Information Sessions)

Commencement

June marks the end of many College of Arts & Sciences students’ undergraduate experience. Interested in attending a graduation ceremony? Click here to find information on ceremonies across campus.

Have an event that you would like to see featured in the ArtSci Roundup? Connect with Kathrine Braseth (kbraseth@uw.edu).

]]> ArtSci Roundup: Censorship and Modern Chinese Literature, Faculty Recital, Writing from the War in Ukraine and more /news/2023/05/05/artsci-roundup-censorship-and-modern-chinese-literature-faculty-recital-writing-from-the-war-in-ukraine-and-more/ Fri, 05 May 2023 17:10:46 +0000 /news/?p=81431 This week, attend the lecture on censorship and modern Chinese literature, learn ways to assist community building in the face of long-haul trans survival, improve Asian migrant massage and sex workers’ living and working conditions, and more.

May 8, 5:00 – 8:00 PM |Kane Hall

This lecture by Professor Michel Hockx (Professor of Chinese Literature, University of Notre Dame) will draw on the insights of New Censorship Studies to discuss examples of censorship of modern Chinese literature from both before and after the 1949 communist takeover.

New Censorship Studies shows us that, when it comes to culture, censorship is the norm rather than the exception, and that censorship is a global phenomenon.

Engaging with New Censorship Studies through case studies from modern Chinese literary practice, this lecture will forge connections between censorship before and after the communist victory, between political censorship and moral (obscenity) censorship, and between print censorship and internet censorship. It also assesses the oversimplified representation of Chinese censorship in American and European discourses, considering it a form of censorship in itself, which discredits or silences Chinese writers and artists.

Free |

May 8, 7:30 PM | , Meany Hall

Chopin’s Nocturnes often disprove their title of ‘Night Pieces.’ Each one is a small tone poem with moments of torment and grandeur, as faculty pianist Craig Sheppard demonstrates in his performance of the complete set of Nocturnes.

$10 – $20 Tickets |

May 9, 1:15 – 3:15 PM | 91 Bothell campus & Zoom

Join Imagining Trans Futures for a talk and conversation with Aveda Adara and Hil Malatino about the practices and dreams of trans and Two Spirit care and community building in the face of long-haul trans survival.

Aveda Adara will discuss her culture and how it relates to her current profession as a DJ and Musician in the underground nightlife scene, including breaking and refusing archetypes and confronting people’s expectations, how Trans is the definition of PUNK and the current infraction of the radical right’s beliefs in healthcare as well as the trans experience of hitting back, building infrastructures politically and communally to ensure a stable future.

Hil Malatino will present Weathering: Slow Arts of Trans Endurance. In a moment of profound and widespread transantagonism articulated within both liberal-centrist and alt-right political formations, how do trans subjects cultivate arts of endurance? In an historical moment that seems to demand continuous reactive defense, how are trans subjects building capacities to slow down, bear with, and endure? How do practices of collective care support the cultivation of such capacities amidst an urgent now? How are artists figuring the slow and mostly unspectacular art of long-haul trans survival?

Free |

May 9, 6:30 PM – 8:00 PM | Kane Hall

This Katz Distinguished Lecture with Daphne Brooks will tell the story of modern music-making and Broadway, about “highbrow” and “lowbrow” cultures, opera and jazz, the politics of race, gender, class and the early recording industry. It’s the story of how intimate and joyous artistic collaboration as well as tense, sometimes fractious competition framed the conditions of creative labor forged by Black women theatrical pioneers and music luminaries—Anne Brown, Ethel Waters, Eva Jessye, to name a few—and white auteurs: George Gershwin, DuBose Heyward, Virgil Thomson, Gertrude Stein and others.

This talk sets out to reveal how Black women musicians’ aesthetic revolutions in 1920s and ‘30s sound and theater culture were artistic obsessions and objects of inquiry in the lifeworlds of white moderns. Their sounds, this talk argues, are the driving force at the heart of Gershwin and Heyward’s landmark opera Porgy and Bess (1935) as well as Heyward’s lesser-known Broadway drama, Mamba’s Daughters (1939).

Free |

May 9, 4:00 – 5:30 PM | Denny Hall

The Ukrainian journalist Stanislav Aseyev’s In Isolation: Dispatches from Occupied Donbas is an extraordinarily courageous chronicle of the war in Ukraine that began nine years ago with Russia’s aggression through its separatist proxies. Written in the period 2015-2017, Aseyev’s dispatches expressed anti-separatist opinions while the author was living in occupied Donbas. The author’s reflections on everyday life and politics are filtered through the theme of time. References to the present, past, and future, calendars, history, and temporal patterns are found throughout the volume.

Situating these dispatches alongside Ukrainian poet Iya Kiva’s work and in the context of Eugène Minkowski’s Lived Time: Phenomenological and Psychopathological Studies and Hannah Arendt’s The Human Condition, this talk argues that Aseyev’s work provides a profound investigation into the experience of time that resonates with philosophical reflections on psychological and political implications of what has been called “lived time” both under duress and in “normal” circumstances.

Free |

May 11, 5:00 – 7:00 PM | Kane Hall

At this annual celebration of human rights work, students conducting human rights research will showcase their research and highlight the newest project, “Strategies for Massage Parlor Workers’ Rights,” in collaboration with the Seattle Massage Parlor Project (MPOP).

This project centers community-led campaigns and research to find systemic ways to improve Asian migrant massage and sex workers’ living and working conditions in the Chinatown/International District and the greater Seattle area.

Free |

May 11, 3:30 – 5:00 PM |Thomson Hall

The start of the Russia’s war on Ukraine in 2014 has impacted regional security of the Black Sea, especially the occupation of Crimea. But the massive invasion of the 2022 has led to even more profound implications. The Black Sea area has become a battleground, where all sorts of contemporary weaponry have been used. Despite Russia’s earlier inroads into the south of Ukraine and its total naval domination in numbers, it has failed to convert it into real lasting strategic advantages. The recent liberation of Kherson and fear in Moscow that Ukraine might go into Crimea, changes situation. The instability has effected everyone in the region. The trade has been disrupted, specifically with the blockade of Ukraine’s ports, which had impact around the world.

There is much anxiety in the region. This spills over into wider European space, with Black Sea area serving as its “soft underbelly”. The NATO, EU, US all pay attention to the developments in the area, adjusting their strategic thinking and operational stance accordingly.

Free |

Have an event that you would like to see featured in the ArtSci Roundup? Connect with Lauren Zondag (zondagld@uw.edu).

]]> ArtSci Roundup: Public Lectures, Art Exhibitions, Music Project Festival and more /news/2023/04/21/artsci-roundup-public-lectures-art-exhibitions-music-project-festival-and-more/ Fri, 21 Apr 2023 21:15:14 +0000 /news/?p=81257 This week, attend the annual Schiedel Lecture, learn about the transactional relationship between mental health research and care, enjoy the Improvised Music Project Festival held by 91 students and faculty and more.

April 25, 6:00 – 7:30 PM |Kane Hall

A long-standing tradition since 1998, this event honors Professor Thomas Scheidel’s lifetime of scholarship, teaching, and academic leadership by bringing distinguished scholars to the 91 Department of Communication to meet and engage with faculty and students who are pursuing advanced studies in communication.

In this talk, Dr. Ballard will illuminate how time is created through communication design, a process of intervening in human activity to enable certain forms of communication and avoid others.

Free |

April 26, 7:00 – 9:00 PM | Kane Hall & Live Stream

This free, public series is made possible by a generous bequest from Professor Allen L. Edwards. Professor Allen Edwards was affiliated with the 91 Department of Psychology for half of a century, from his arrival in Seattle in 1944 as an Associate Professor to his death in 1994. Professor Allen Edwards endowed the Edwards Lectureship to bring nationally and internationally renowned psychologists to campus for short visits to interact with faculty and students.

Free |

April 27, 6:00 – 7:00 PM | Henry Art Gallery

As part of the Henry’s exhibition Taking Care: Collection Support Studio, this series of conversations amongst museum professionals specializing in collections will take place in the museum’s South Gallery.

Visitors will be joined by a panel of collections managers who will discuss caring for different types of collections.

Free |

April 27, 7:30 PM | Meany Hall

The 91 Wind Ensemble (Timothy Salzman, director) and Symphonic Band (Shaun Day, director) present“New Beginnings,” a concert ofmusic by Jacques Press, Jennifer Jolley, Ida Gotkovsky, Ralph Vaughn Williams, Eric Ewazen, and Nancy Galbraith. With guest soloists Miho Takekawa, marimba; and Kiwa Mizutani, piano; and guest conductor Anita Kumar.

$10 Tickets |

April 27, 4:30 – 6:00 PM | Communications Building

This talk introduces a concept of translation developed by the Indo-Persian poet-philosopher Bidel of Delhi. In his autobiography and narrative poems, Bidel advocates for a form of practical comparison he calls crossings.

As Bidel unfolds this concept’s multilayered connotations,crossingsemerges as an open-minded, humane, and creative endeavor to understand another tradition through translation and imaginative comparison. This practice ofcrossingsis something that anyone, regardless of their religious affiliation, education, and social status, can and should attempt to undertake.

This is a 91 Translation Studies Hub event.

Free |

April 28, 7:30 PM | Meany Hall

David Alexander Rahbee conducts the 91 Symphony and winners of the 202391 Concerto Competition in a program of music by Camille Saint-Saëns, Alfred Desenclos, Franz Liszt, Hector Berlioz, Franz Schmidt, and Richard Wagner. Featuring Concerto Competition winners Dalma Ashby, violin; Katie Zundel, baritone saxophone; and Michael Gu, piano. With Daren Weissfisch and Ryan Farris, assistant conductors.

$10 Tickets |

April 28 – 29, 7:30 PM | Meany Hall

The School of Music and the student-run Improvised Music Project present the annual Improvised Music Project Festival (IMPFEST), featuring two evenings of distinct performances by the 91 Music students, faculty, and guests. Featured artists for IMPFest 2023 are composer/pianist (and 2023 GRAMMY winner) Kris Davisand multi-instrumentalist/composerMichael Libramento.

$15 – $20 Tickets|

April 28, 12:30 – 1:30 PM | Hans Rosling Building

An author meets critic event featuring The Refugee System: A Sociological Approach, a new book by Rawan Arar and David FitzGerald.

Some people facing violence and persecution flee. Others stay. How do households in danger decide who should go, where to relocate, and whether to keep moving? What are the conditions in countries of origin, transit, and reception that shape people’s options? This incisive book tells the story of how one Syrian family, spread across several countries, tried to survive the civil war and live in dignity. This story forms a backdrop to explore and explain the refugee system.

Presenting a sharp analysis of refugee structures worldwide, this book offers invaluable insights for students and scholars of international migration and refugee studies across the social sciences, as well as policy makers and those involved in refugee and asylum work.

Free |

Have an event that you would like to see featured in the ArtSci Roundup? Connect with Lauren Zondag (zondagld@uw.edu).

]]> ArtSci Roundup: Bambitchell: Dolphins, ships and other vessels, Illustrating Injustice: The Power of Print, and More /news/2021/03/09/artsci-roundup-bambitchell-dolphins-ships-and-other-vessels-illustrating-injustice-the-power-of-print-and-more/ Tue, 09 Mar 2021 19:49:03 +0000 /news/?p=73199 During this time of uncertainty and isolation, find solace in digital opportunitiesto connect, share, and engage. Each week, we will share upcoming events that bring the 91, and the greater community, together online.

Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All 91 faculty, staff, and students have access to.

Protest, Race and Citizenship across African Worlds:Ethiopia in Theory, Theory as Memoir

March 17, 12:00 – 1:30 PM |

Can Tizita, the Amharic term for memory and nostalgia as well as a musical form of lament, serve as a tool for capturing the untimely interference of the past in stories of the Ethiopian revolution?
ElleniCentime Zeleke, Assistant Professor in the Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies at Columbia University, will explore this question, as part of the Jackson School of International Studies‘Protest, Race and Citizenship across African Worlds series.

Free |

Bambitchell: Dolphins, ships and other vessels

March 18, 12:00 – 1:30 PM |

In this performance reading, hosted by the Henry Art Gallery, artist duo Bambitchell continue their exploration of the legal frameworks that govern non-human animals and objects, moving from the territorial jurisdictions explored in their film(2019), to the legal realm of the sea.Dolphins, ships and other vesselsis a polyvocal narrative that spans bodies of water. Stretching from Te Moana-o-Raukawa, to the South China Sea, the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and the Clyde and Kaniatarowanenneh Rivers, the narrative traces the disappearance and reappearance of a dolphin, the reincarnations of ships, and the embodiments of Jinn—as vessels, mammals, water, myth, and law.

Free |

91 Dance Presents

Streaming through March 28 |

The Department of Dance is excited to present new works from nationally and internationally recognized choreographers Rujeko Dumbutshena, Alana Isiguen, Rachael Lincoln, Juliet McMains, “Majinn” Mike O’Neal, and Jennifer Salk, with guest artists Alex Dugdale and Alice Gosti.

Presented digitally, these explorations of dance on film examine themes ranging from human connection and identity to the joy of rhythm and music as movement. The new works, generated from a diverse range of movement styles, feature dancers set against local Seattle backdrops including Magnuson Park and on stage at Meany Center for the Performing Arts. The performances feature new collaborations and several original music compositions, including by Zimbabwean-born local Seattle artist Paul Mataruse and compositions by 91 music students Griffin Becker and Lucas Zeiter performed by the 91 Wind Ensemble.

Free |

Illustrating Injustice: The Power of Print

Through May 9 |

This exhibition at the Henry Art Gallery highlights the power of printed material to communicate social and systemic injustices, and features work by French lithographer Honoré Daumierand American photographer Danny Lyon, as well as a selection of late twentieth-century prison newsletters.Daumier and Lyon may have worked in different centuries and on different continents, but each was troubled by the injustices prevalent in his society.

Free |

Jacob Lawrence:The American Struggle

Through May 23 |

Jacob Lawrence: The American Strugglequestions the stories we’ve been told by amplifying narratives that have been systematically overlooked from America’s history. This exhibition reunites Lawrence’s revolutionary 30-panel seriesStruggle: From the History of the American People(1954–56) for the first time since 1958, and Seattle Art Museum will be its only West Coast venue. These modernist paintings chronicle pivotal moments from the American Revolution through to westward expansion and feature Black, female, and Native protagonists as well as the founders of the United States.Lawrence interprets the democratic debates that defined the early nation and echoed into the civil rights movements during which he was painting theStruggleseries. Works by contemporary artists Derrick Adams, Bethany Collins, and Hank Willis Thomas engage themes of democracy, justice, truth, and the politics of inclusion to show that the struggle for expansive representation in America continues.

$7.00 – $10.00 |

Looking for more?

Check out 91AA’s Stronger Together web page formore digital engagement opportunities.

]]> ‘Making Amends’ podcast explores remorse, intention among men at Oregon prison /news/2021/02/02/making-amends-podcast-explores-remorse-intention-among-men-at-oregon-prison/ Tue, 02 Feb 2021 17:31:25 +0000 /news/?p=72559
“Making Amends,” a new podcast by 91 professor Steve Herbert, features interviews with several men who are incarcerated at the Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem.

 

“My reputation is what I’ve done. But my character is who I am.”

This is how the listener meets Theron Hall, a 35-year-old man serving a life sentence at the Oregon State Penitentiary. At first, Hall is explaining how he got his prison nickname: Pit Bull. But he quickly elevates his story, from a chronology of events to an exploration of remorse and his intent to live a better life.

“I’m learning,” he tells his interviewer, “that Theron is actually a very compassionate person.”

That kind of reflection forms the foundation of “,” a podcast released in January and created by , the Mark Torrance Professor of Law, Societies and Justice at the 91. Herbert taught and audio-recorded a class on atonement at the Oregon prison in early 2020; he also conducted one-on-one interviews with several class participants. The podcast provides a storytelling medium for the individual reflections of six men, and the sharing with a wider audience themes of harm, regret and the capacity for change.

The stories of these six men mirror those of thousands of other people who are incarcerated, Herbert explains. Given the number of people incarcerated in the United States — — these stories also reveal larger societal attitudes toward wrongdoing and punishment.

“We have 2 million people whose stories we largely ignore, and many have very compelling stories. Many are wracked with remorse. Many want to be something other than the worst thing they’ve ever done, and they are trying hard to be that person,” Herbert said. “But we don’t make it as easy for them as we should and we don’t recognize that change as often as we should. Nobody benefits from that. We’re not safer, we’re not a better society by ignoring those stories.

“We could have a more cost-effective, and a more generally effective, criminal justice system if we took these stories seriously.”

“Making Amends” is available anywhere you listen to podcasts. Find Steve Herbert’s class readings, discussion questions and more on the podcast .

 

The podcast is the culmination of years of teaching and outreach inside prisons for Herbert, primarily at the Monroe Correctional Complex northeast of Seattle. After writing on life-sentenced prisoners, he sought to find another medium to tell stories of prisoner change. He ultimately found an entry point for an audio storytelling project, via the Oregon Department of Corrections’ maximum-security facility in Salem. And while the COVID-19 pandemic cut his time a bit short at the prison last winter, Herbert determined that he had enough to create an eight-episode first season.

Herbert sat down with 91 News to discuss the experience of “Making Amends.”

How did you combine your role as an academic with that of a podcast interviewer?

Inside every prison I’ve done work in, there has been a community of like-minded prisoners who are supporting each other in their efforts to live a better life and to be a better person, and so for the podcast, I was looking for a way to get those stories and try to get a sense of whatever community might exist.

For each of the classes I taught, I wrote a five- or six-page reading that was a summary of a lot of the literature that explores the nature of wrongdoing: What are the ways that we harm each other, how do we feel about ourselves when we recognize that we’ve harmed somebody else, how do other people feel about us when we harm them. If we’ve done damage, what are the different strategies available to us for repairing that damage? It enabled me to draw upon what I knew — and needed to learn a little bit better — in terms of the philosophy of punishment, the nature of wrongdoing, and the nature of repair. I would start teaching first thing in the morning on Tuesdays, and then do my interviews before jumping on the train back to Seattle.

How did you settle on whom to interview, and what do you know of them now?

The chaplains’ area of the prison has a long history of bringing in outsiders for classes, bringing in students from Willamette University, Oregon State University and the University of Oregon. So that area was used to having outside people come in, but I was the first person, to my knowledge, to have permission to do audio recording.

I started teaching this class the very first part of January. I had gone in the previous June and September, and each time met with the chaplains and some number of the men, many of whom ended up in the class. So they had met me, had heard what I was trying to accomplish and understood what my goals were. They made a conscious decision to be part of the podcast, and they knew that I was going to ask them specifics about their crimes. They were under no illusions about what I was trying to accomplish and were eager to participate. Some of them were a little bit more comfortable because they had told their story more often, and some of them were a bit less practiced and were more shy.

[Since then,] I’ve been in sporadic email contact with two of them. They’ve heard the podcast, and I’m very happy to say they like it very much. My biggest worry was that they would feel that I hadn’t done their stories justice, so I’m very relieved and honored to hear they feel like I did.

What did you learn about the podcast format?

That the audience is listening, rather than reading. I learned a lot about audio storytelling, how to collect audio recordings, how to write for the microphone instead of for the page. Weaving stories together was perhaps the biggest challenge.

The feedback I had from people who listened to the first cut of the first episode was that my tone was all wrong. I was too professorial. My words were too long, my sentences were too long, I sounded a little stilted. I had to learn to write as if I was in conversation with someone, rather than being read by someone.

Doing a podcast certainly drew upon my skills as an academic researcher: Analyzing the interview data for the podcast was the same as if I was doing it for a book or an article, and so certainly my prior experience as a researcher was indispensable. With the podcast, I’m excited to reach a wider audience than I could if I were only writing books.

Is there anything you wish you’d been able to include?

I couldn’t interview everyone as often as I wanted. We had planned a culminating event, where the men were going to write some reflections of their experience and invite people from outside. We were in the process of fleshing out what that would look like when the pandemic hit. I left one Tuesday, as usual, and was told two days later I couldn’t come back. So I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye, or wrap up the experience with them. It still feels unfinished, and I’m hoping that I’ll get back in there, maybe by the end of the summer.

Do you have plans for additional seasons?

I am in active conversations with relevant parties about two potential follow-up series. But each will require access to prisons. As it starts to look possible for prisons to reopen to visitors, my plans will hopefully take clearer shape. There are many stories about our criminal justice process that the podcast format lends itself to telling. I am excited to explore these additional possibilities.

 

For more information, contact Herbert at skherb@uw.edu.

 

 

 

 

]]> ArtSci Roundup: Meany On Screen:Cuarteto Latinoamericano, Maria Gaspar: Disappearance Landscape, and More /news/2021/01/27/artsci-roundup-meany-on-screen-cuarteto-latinoamericano-maria-gaspar-disappearance-landscape-and-more/ Wed, 27 Jan 2021 19:47:52 +0000 /news/?p=72419 During this time of uncertainty and isolation, find solace in digital opportunitiesto connect, share, and engage. Each week, we will share upcoming events that bring the 91, and the greater community, together online.

Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All 91 faculty, staff, and students have access to.

Outpost: Words and Music

February 1, 5:30 PM PST |

Carrie Shaw, 91 School of Music faculty member and Mellon Faculty Fellow, will premier three commissions she initiated as part of her Mellon project, Expanding Repertoire and Research in Vocal Music with New Accompanied Technologies,at the Great Northern Festival.

Tickets are $15 |

History Lecture Series:Arming the Police and the ‘Social Source of Our Distresses’

February 3, 6:00 – 7:00 PM |

In this lecture, Associate Professor of History Bruce Hevlywill investigate the use of handguns by American police officers beginning with Teddy Roosevelt’s tenure on the New York City Police Commission in the 1890s.

Next in the series:

  • February 10, 6:00 – 7:00 PM: Digital Discontents, from the Age of the Mainframe to the Era of Big Tech

Free |

Meany On Screen:Cuarteto Latinoamericano

February 5 – 12 |

The world-renowned Cuarteto Latinoamericano has been on a mission to present great works of the Latin American chamber repertoire since its foundingin Mexico in 1982. In a hosted by the Meany Center, Cuarteto Latinoamericano featuresthree Latin American musical luminaries. And, , takes a deeper look at the composers presented by Cuarteto Latinoamericano in this creative process conversation between composer Gabriela Ortiz, first violinist Saúl Bitrán, Professor of Cinema and Media Studies and of Spanish and Portuguese Studies Anthony Geist, and Meany CenterExecutive and Artistic Director Michelle Witt.

Free |

Maria Gaspar: Disappearance Landscape

February 6, 10:00 AM – 11:30 AM & 1:30 – 3:00 PM |

Disappearance Landscape, hosted by the Henry Art Gallery,is a virtual workshop that uses the body to interrogate and intervene highly contested sites. Using green screen strategies, participants will examine jails, prisons, border walls, conflict zones, and other places of power in order to mediate, flip, dissect, transpose, or dismantle forms of oppression and confinement.

Free |

2021 Critical Issues Lecture Series:Hồng-Ân Trương

February 5, 12:00 PM |

In the 2021 Critical Issues Lecture Series is presented by the School of Art + Art History + Design in collaboration with the Henry Art Gallery.On February 5th, the lecture will be presented byHồng-Ân Trương, who uses photography, sound, video, and performance to examine histories of war and immigrant and refugee narratives through a decolonial framework.

Next in the series:

  • February 12, 2:30pm:Ariel René Jackson
  • February 19, 12pm:Eva Barto

Free |

Making Amends Podcast

“Making Amends,” a podcast byProfessor of Law, Societies, and Justice Steve Herbert provides an opportunity to hear voices too commonly ignored in conversations about our criminal justice policy. It also challenges listeners to consider how we might better ensure greater accountability for those who commit wrongs. It asks: If we wish to see as many prisoners as possible pursue genuine accountability, do our current practices of punishment help us achieve that goal?

Free |

Looking for more?

Check out 91AA’s Stronger Together web page formore digital engagement opportunities.

]]> 91 Center for Human Rights studies law enforcement collaboration with federal agencies on immigration /news/2017/10/02/uw-center-for-human-rights-studies-law-enforcement-collaboration-with-federal-agencies-on-immigration/ Mon, 02 Oct 2017 20:28:25 +0000 /news/?p=54881 Cities and counties concerned about immigrant rights should closely examine law enforcement’s collaboration with federal immigration authorities — and the role a for-profit company has in drafting language used in many law enforcement policy manuals — according to a new report from the 91’s

The center, in the , has released the first in a series of research memos under an initiative called , which seeks to “strengthen the work of frontline human rights organizations in Washington state.”

The memo, first in a planned series, is titled “.” It notes the center’s (thus far unanswered) requests for information from Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — about immigration enforcement in Washington state.

“We need to be able trust law enforcement to keep us safe,” said center director , a professor of international studies and the . “Numerous courts have found that our local police or sheriffs shouldn’t be enforcing immigration law, and for that reason many jurisdictions have barred cops from asking questions about immigration status.

“But if they’re calling ICE to ask the question — and then to haul members of the community away for civil violations — it’s not that different than if they’d done the asking themselves. And it ruptures the immigrant communities’ ability to trust law enforcement.”

The report also describes the center’s survey of scores of police, sheriff and other Washington state agencies on immigration matters and sounds a note of caution about , a California-based for-profit company that provides language used in many, though not all, police policy manuals.

To study how jurisdictions “are defining the limits of local law enforcement collaboration with ICE and CBP” in their policy language, the center submitted information requests to 165 Washington state agencies — 131 city or town police departments, 26 county sheriffs and eight state agencies within the where CBP claims authority to conduct stops.

Studying such agency and other documents, the researchers cited problematic policies now in force:

  • Local policy manuals often tell law enforcement officers to call CBP or ICE to the scene even in encounters where no crime has occurred. Once on the scene, CBP or ICE officers ask about the person’s immigration status — which “effectively converts a local law enforcement encounter into an occasion for immigration enforcement.”
  • Though most jurisdictions instruct jails not to honor federal ICE detainer requests without a warrant, policy manuals offer inadequate guidance on which types of warrants are sufficient to clear concerns that would prohibit “unreasonable searches and seizures.”
  • Also, such policy manuals still instruct jails to notify ICE prior to an inmate’s release. “While this represents an improvement over holding them without cause,” the researchers write, “such information-sharing may still facilitate the handoff of inmates to immigration authorities, including in cases where they have not been convicted of any crime.”

Not all jurisdictions, the researchers note, have adopted policy language based on Lexipol’s guidelines, and they cite Seattle and King County as “positive examples.” King County has an ordinance in place barring ICE detainers unless they are accompanied by a judicial warrant.

The researchers cite what they feel are weaknesses in Lexipol’s taxpayer-paid service to public clients.

The company, they write, promises clients up-to-date, “state-specific” information including best practices and developments in immigration case law. But the report finds that Lexipol’s guidance sometimes results in “worse, rather than better” policy language on immigrant rights.

“Many of the policy manuals legitimatize ethnic profiling by suggesting that cops can derive reasonable suspicion of criminal activity from a person’s ability to speak English and ‘other factors based on an officer’s experience,'” Godoy said. “Courts have condemned such behavior.”

The researchers add that jurisdictions might save money and reduce potential legal liability by skipping Lexipol’s costly service and instead pooling their resources and seeking guidance from Washington state’s attorney general.

“These concerns are not abstract hypotheticals,” the researchers write. “The policy manuals we examined translate into real-life cases of rights abuse, some of which have been deemed unconstitutional by Washington courts.”

In such cases, everyday law enforcement encounters too easily become immigration enforcement cases “because local law enforcement handed off Washington residents to federal immigration authorities in ways that violated their rights.”

Godoy said, “We don’t want people in Washington state to be treated unfairly because of the way they look or the language they speak. It’s wrong.”

###

For more information, contact Godoy at 206-616-3585 or agodoy@uw.edu.

]]> 91 class pairs students and inmates for unique learning experience /news/2016/01/04/uw-class-pairs-students-and-inmates-for-unique-learning-experience/ Mon, 04 Jan 2016 18:02:20 +0000 /news/?p=40659
Professor Steve Herbert, left, addresses the class while 91 student Alexa Cathcart and University Behind Bars student Devon Adams look on. Photo: 91

On a rainy December afternoon, a group of students in the 91’s Law, Societies & Justice program sit in a classroom discussing what elements might be included in a restorative justice program.

The conversation is lively, the comments thoughtful. But this isn’t any ordinary classroom, and it isn’t your usual group of university students. The 91 students were taking the autumn quarter class on culture, crime and criminal justice alongside 10 male classmates who brought more than theoretical knowledge to the table — all are serving time at the Monroe Correctional Complex northeast of Seattle.

For the inmates, the “mixed-enrollment” course held at the prison was a rare chance to study alongside fourth-year 91 students in an academically rigorous setting. For the 91 students, it was an equally rare opportunity to get a sense of how issues discussed in class play out in real life. To meet with their classmates, they had to undergo security checks, pass through metal gates and walk by an outdoor recreation area secured with razor-wire fencing.

“We talk about mass incarceration — we talk about 2.2 million people in the U.S. imprisoned — but getting to know these people, that’s completely different,” said 91 student Meron Fikru.

“We’re taught to fear prisoners. We’re taught to distance ourselves from them,” she said. “But these guys are brilliant. They’re funny and they’re humble and they’re so respectful. It’s been a really humanizing experience.”

Classmate Becky Womelsdorf plans to attend law school and said the course provided something a traditional classroom setting could not.

“It’s really beneficial to learn about these issues from a perspective that’s different from what we’re usually exposed to,” she said. “This is not something you can get anywhere else.”

The class was taught by , a 91 professor and director of the program. It’s the third mixed-enrollment class that Herbert, a past recipient of the 91’s distinguished teaching award, has taught at the prison. The topics have varied, but all have been fourth-year courses.

Herbert’s goal is to provide an intellectually stimulating experience for all students, and he said the 91 students are often taken aback at how prepared their prison counterparts are.

Students in the mixed-enrollment course work together on a class assignment. Clockwise, from left, inmate William Joice, 91 student Talia Balma, inmate Noel Caldellis and 91 student Becky Womelsdorf. Photo: 91

“They’re very good classmates,” he said. “There’s a very clear expectation that the students are meant to carry the load of the conversation, and the [prison] students are very well-prepared.”

Hannah Schwendeman welcomed the challenge. “You need to be prepared for class,” she said. “Having partners for learning who are so passionate and so informed has been great.”

Inmate Noel Caldellis, 28, had no college education when he came to prison in 2008 on a first-degree murder conviction. He’s now working on a bachelor’s in history and said taking Herbert’s classes instilled confidence in his abilities.

“It’s helped me understand just how close we are to college students who are on the outside,” said Caldellis, who is scheduled for release in 2029. “Besides circumstance and education, we are just as capable of doing college-level work.”

The 91 class is offered through , a Seattle nonprofit that provides college courses for prisoners. The organization offers about 30 classes at the in Monroe, including a Saturday night arts and lecture series, college courses for students pursuing associate degrees, and non-credit courses.

The 91 courses are made possible through the , named in honor of a Law, Societies & Justice alum who was impassioned about prison issues.They are non-credit, since the university’s tuition fees would be out of reach for inmates. Washington law currently prohibits using state funds for higher education courses in prison, but state lawmakers have considered a bill that would eliminate the ban.

University Beyond Bars aims to address educational inequity, improve inmates’ chances of employment after release and reduce recidivism rates. A 2013 found that inmates who participate in prison education programs have 43 percent lower odds of returning to prison than inmates who do not.

Inmate Arthur Longworth, left, talks with 91 students (from left) Kathryn Joy, Meron Fikru and Emily Krueger. Photo: 91

The 91 classes emulate a regular classroom experience as closely as possible, with the same expectations and course load for everyone, said Stacey Reeh, University Beyond Bars’ executive director.

“Our students want to be held to the same standards,” she said. “Our goal is to recreate the university classroom, and these classes really do that. They really feel like they are taking a 91 class.”

Prison is often a racially segregated environment, Reeh said, but the classes bring together inmates from diverse backgrounds. Students learn skills that are important on the outside, she said, like critical thinking and effective communication. Some become leaders across the prison, communicating with upper-level administrators and even state legislators.

Devon Adams, who is serving time for first-degree murder, sits on the program’s 19-member . He works as a UBB teaching assistant and tutors fellow inmates in college prep math courses. He’s just two courses away from completing a bachelor’s degree through Ohio University, but it’s been a long road to get there.

In his early days of imprisonment, Adams said, he saw no path forward. Education gave him something positive to focus on. He first took an English class, and to his surprise, got a B.

“I was used to Cs and Ds and barely passing, so I thought, ‘man, maybe I can do this,'” said Adams, 36, who is scheduled for release in 2024. “I began to build this confidence, and now I’m thinking about what possibilities life has to offer.”

Adams has taken two of Herbert’s classes and plans to pursue a graduate degree. He wants to be a positive role model for his daughter, who is graduating from high school in the spring and hopes to attend 91.

“I can tell her, ‘This is what your daddy’s doing,'” he said. “I’m not in here squandering opportunities away and disregarding the pain I put my family through,” said Adams.

“A big part of my rehabilitation, a big part of my transformation, has to do with wanting to make my family proud of me in some way. That’s really a motivating factor for me,” he said.

At the end of the class, the last of the quarter, the students gather to share their suggestions for developing a restorative justice program. Then 91 student Nathan Bean presents the inmates with cards their classmates signed that morning.

“It’s an understatement to say that these are the very least we could provide for you,” he said. “This experience is going to stay with us, and it means a lot more than these cards are going to convey. It has been an honor for us to be here and learn alongside you.”

]]> Harsh prison sentences swell ranks of lifers and raise questions about fairness, study finds /news/2015/07/07/harsh-prison-sentences-swell-ranks-of-lifers-and-raise-questions-about-fairness-study-finds/ Tue, 07 Jul 2015 15:51:16 +0000 /news/?p=37754
There are close to 1,400 inmates serving official or de facto life sentences in Washington state. Photo: David McSpadden / Flickr

Stricter state sentencing laws in Washington have swelled the ranks of inmates serving life sentences to nearly one in five.

And some lifers who opted to go to trial are serving much longer sentences than others who committed the same crimes and plea-bargained — raising questions about equitable treatment of prisoners.

Those are among the findings in a new analysis by undergraduate honors students in the 91’s program, who sought to determine the number of lifers in Washington prisons, the legal processes that lead to life sentences and the cost of housing those inmates, many of whom will die behind bars.

Washington largely eliminated its parole system after the state’s Sentencing Reform Act was enacted in 1984. The SRA was intended to increase consistency in sentencing and shift the goal of sentencing from rehabilitation, which research at the time indicated did not reduce crime, to punishment.

“At the time, the conventional wisdom was that rehabilitation didn’t work, and that parole boards were making arbitrary decisions,” said , a professor in the Law, Societies & Justice program and the Department of Sociology, who oversaw the students’ research.

The upshot of the SRA was that except for a few categories of inmates — juveniles, certain sex offenders sentenced to life and prisoners sentenced before the law was enacted — most prisoners would never go before a review board, have their sentences reconsidered or have a chance at early release. Ever.

Two consequent voter-approved initiatives caused the numbers of lifers in Washington state to increase dramatically over the past two decades. The so-called “” law of 1993, the first of its type in the nation, mandated life without parole for three serious felony convictions. The initiative followed two years later, requiring mandatory sentence additions for crimes involving guns. The report mentions one prisoner who was sentenced to 83 years due to weapons charges alone.

The students analyzed data for all felony cases sentenced in Washington state from July 1985 to July 2013, more than 600,600 in total.Theyfound that:

  • Almost one in five (19.3 percent) of inmates in Washington are serving life sentences.
  • Of Washington’s prisoners, 11.3 percent are serving life with parole — most are sex offenders eligible for review, and a few are inmates sentenced before 1984 — and 8 percent are serving official life without parole sentences or “de facto” ones of 470 months or more, based on the of a life sentence.
  • Nationally, one in nine prisoners is serving an official life sentence.
  • De facto lifers make up almost half the state’s life without parole population.
  • African-Americans comprise only about 4 percent of Washington’s population, but make up 28 percent of prisoners serving life without parole.
  • The average life without parole sentence costs taxpayers $2.4 million per prisoner. Before 1984, when lifers were often released, the average cost was $767,895 per prisoner (in 2014 dollars).
  • Half of those serving life without parole sentences were sentenced under the three strikes law, and almost 20 percent of de facto lifers are serving sentences of 39 years or more solely due to additional weapons charges.

The students also found widespread discrepancies in the life sentences given for identical crimes committed by inmates who opted for trial compared with those who accepted plea bargains. Prisoners who were tried for homicide, for example, got sentences 9.6 percent longer on average than their counterparts who plea-bargained, the students found.

The gap was even greater for less serious offenses. Inmates convicted of first-degree assault through trial got sentences 45.3 percent longer than those who accepted plea bargains. Two-thirds of life without parole sentences were handed down after trials, the report found, while only 5 percent of cases resulting in other sentences had gone to trial.

“This suggests that there is a correlation between [life without parole] sentences and the trial process, and raises the possibility that people who take their case to trial are being penalized for doing so,” the authors write.

Alex Lynch, one of the report’s authors, said the data also suggests that the Sentencing Reform Act’s goal of reducing sentencing disparities has failed.

“We ran the data over and over and over,” said Lynch, who graduated this year. “The ranges are remarkable. They speak to the question of how effective the SRA has been.”

Another question is how the death penalty might impact life sentences. Washington is one of 31 states with the death penalty, which was suspended in the U.S. between 1972 and 1976. During that time, Beckett said, many states authorized life without parole sentences as an alternative to the death penalty but retained it even after capital punishment was reintroduced.

Opposition to capital punishment seems to have strengthened life without parole sentencing, she said, as opponents push for it as a more acceptable alternative.

“Opposition to the death penalty has made life without parole seem more normal,” Beckett said.

The study coincides with a growing national conversation about mass incarceration in the United States, which has the world’s largest prison population — about 2.2 million people, according to the . Presidential hopefuls and have made mass incarceration a campaign issue, and other Democratic and Republican candidates are calling for .

The 91 study makes three recommendations: that Washington create a review board and process that allows every lifer to be re-evaluated after a pre-determined amount of time, repeal the three strikes and Hard Time for Armed Crime laws and expand rehabilitative programs to help inmates reintegrate into society after release.

In February, the state house passed that would ease the Hard Time for Armed Crime law. The 91 students hope to present their report to the Washington State Sentencing Guidelines Commission, and Lynch said she’s encouraged by feedback the document has received from local stakeholders.

“We’ve gotten overwhelmingly positive support,” she said. “We’ve had a lot of positive interactions with folks that are in a position to make some change.”

The study’s co-authors are Dakota Blagg, Madison Brown, Alison Buchanan, Bryce Ellis, Olivia Gee, Andreas Hewitt, Zoe Liebeskind, Katelyn Lowthorp, Hannah Schwendeman and Nicholas Scott.

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