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From: Simon Rolston <simonrolston@xxxxxxxx>
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Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2007 12:51:23 -0500 (EST)
I'm a graduate student in the English department at the University of British Columbia, Canada, and I'm currently working on (and interested in) American prisoner autobiographies. At the moment I'm writing my qualifying papers (which are similar to comprehensive exams), one of which is on Foucault and discipline. Although Foucault is very suspicious of autobiography, I think his work is quite useful for my project. For example, I'm interested in questioning the assumption that prisoner writings are emancipatory texts, that writing about oneself when imprisoned is somehow a 'freeing' activity. This is not to undermine the work accomplished by American inmates. Rather it is to acknowledge the difficulties a prisoner faces when writing (and even speaking) from inside the belly of the beast. If anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them.
Thanks for letting me join up!
Best,
Simon Rolston
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