English Department News
Changing Lives Through Literature Featured in the New York Times
On February 26, 2009, the New York Times Sunday Book Review featured an essay, "Read a Book, Get Out of Jail" on Changing Lives Through Literature (CLTL), a nationally recognized alternative to incarceration co-founded in 1991 by Professor Robert P. Waxler. The article, penned by Harvard Professor of English Leah Price, recounts the young professorss visit to a CLTL session on the UMass Dartmouth campus in Fall 2008.
Price doesn't take a definitive side in the books-versus-bars debate, but seasons her observations with a hefty dose of skepticism. She acknowledges that "reading has always provided a lifeline for prisoners, whether for utilitarian purposes or for spiritual searching" and situates the practice within a larger literary tradition. At the same, she equates the practice of assigning prisoners to read literature with punishment enforced by literary ankle bracelets, with Oprah's Book Club, and with acts of religious indoctrination.
The overwhelming response to the article suggested that many New York Times readers believe strongly in Changing Lives Through Literature's potential to reshape the face of criminal sentencing in America. In the days following the article's publication, numerous individuals from around the country contacted the program to find out more about furthering the mission of CLTL and starting programs in their own towns. Hits on the program's blog, Changing Lives, Changing Minds, reached an all-time high, as readers took to the internet to learn more about the incarceration alternative.
The full article appears in The New York Times Sunday Book Review.
Also online at the NYT website: "Read a Book Get out of Jail"
In the wake of the New York Times piece, Changing Lives Through Literature issued two responses to the Price article : "Alternative Sentences" a letter to the editor, featured in the March 22nd issue of the Sunday Book Review (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/22/books/review/Letters-t-ALTERNATIVES_LETTERS.html) and "A View on the Times";—an essay posted on the Changing Lives, Changing Minds blog (http://cltlblog.wordpress.com/2009/03/04/a-view-on-the-times/).
For more information about Changing Lives Through Literature, check out the official website at http://cltl.umassd.edu and the official blog at http://cltl.umassd.edu/blog .
