We learn from each other: displacements, activisms and activists around prisons

• Grant number: 20/13026-1
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: May 01, 2021
• End date: April 30, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Anthropology - Urban Anthropology
• Principal Investigator: Guita Grin Debert
• Grantee: Natália Boucas do Lago
• Host Institution: Núcleo de Estudos de Gênero (PAGU). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil
• Associated scholarship(s): 21/14618-2 - Surviving prisons in America: gender, activism, and experience among relatives of prisoners and former prisoners, BE.EP.PD

Abstract

The research seeks to understand networks of activists and activisms related to prisons that involve connections and displacements of relatives of prisoners. They form an emerging activist field around prison in Brazil and Latin America. I intend to investigate the making of these activist networks and follow them throughout the research, describing the flows of people, information, categories and political perspectives produced by the activists. In order to connect actors, categories, practices and subjects that move through the field, I propose an analytical framework in three conceptual axes that encompass gender, agency and the sacredness of mothers; prison, state and criminalization processes; and the assemblages of narratives of suffering and humiliation, as well as its limits. It is an effort to map a particular type of activism that tells us about assemblages and limits from the movements, links and production of knowledge built from the perspective of people directly affected by prisons, even though they are not themselves deprived of their freedom. The methodological approach is based on a multi-sited ethnography composed of participant observation, interviews and document analysis. The research will be produced from an insertion in the Association of Family and Friends of Prisoners (Amparar), having as a starting point the networks of activists of this association. (AU)