Challenging the System

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APPR choices this year reveal how our status--our race, our work and income, our documentation--determine in meaningful ways our access to and treatment by the criminal justice system. Laskas unpacks the controversy over illegal immigration, observing that politicians portray undocumented immigrants as criminals, guilty not only of being in the country illegally but also of robbery, drug trafficking, rape and stealing Americans’ jobs. Yet statistics and our own history tell a different story, of decreasing rates of immigration, of the American tradition of relying on foreign labor in the form of slaves, indentured servants, and wave after wave of immigrants searching for a better life. These groups of people in turn have, historically, faced wave after wave of backlash, leaving the undocumented vulnerable to crime, unable to seek justice or even basic medical care for fear of the police.

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             Investigate the many facets of immigration in America, especially concerning the undocumented person’s relationship to authority and safety.

Medium suggestions: monologue or short play, documentary, investigative journalism, essay, visual art, dance

 

            Examine the causes and repercussions of disproportionate racial representation in prison populations.

Medium suggestions: visual art, essay, dance, monologue or scene