Film & the Law Series: 13th, April 3, 2018

Description

This Film and the Law seminar will present a discussion over themes within the film as they relate to criminal policy making. The film will be followed by a panel discussion in which the audience and the experts will dialogue about legal history, current policy, and the future of justice in the U.S.

Movie Synopsis:

13th is a 2016 American documentary by director Ava DuVernay. The film explores race, justice and mass incarceration in the United States. It is titled after the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which freed the slaves and prohibited slavery (unless as punishment for a crime). DuVernay contends that slavery has been perpetuated in practices since the end of the American Civil War through such actions as criminalizing behavior and enabling police to arrest poor freedmen and force them to work for the state under convict leasing; suppression of African Americans by disenfranchisement, lynchings and Jim Crow; politicians declaring a war on drugs that weigh more heavily on minority communities and, by the late 20th century, mass incarceration of people of color in the United States. She examines the prison-industrial complex and the emerging detention- industrial complex, demonstrating how much money is being made by corporations from such incarcerations.