RECOMMENDED READINGS

The P39A Criminal Law Blog recommends academic pieces along with summaries
of the piece and suggestions for additional readings on the theme.

5

Project 39A recommends Ava DuVernay’s documentary titled, ‘13th’ and Michelle Alexander’s book titled, ‘The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness’.

3

The law and the criminal justice system, we are told, is logical and dispassionate. There is no space in it for the emotions and vulnerabilities of its stakeholders. Consider the life of a ‘prisoner’; incarceration isolates them from everyday life and restricts their autonomy so severely as to be dehumanising. Coupled with the experience of being isolated from their loved ones, feelings of powerlessness, anger and humiliation are common.

3

Project 39A recommends four Indian films – Court (2014), Visaranai (2015), Jai Bhim (2021) and Aakrosh (1980) – which center the experiences of the most marginalised members of society with the criminal justice system, and raise critical questions about the interaction between state power and structural inequality and its impact on justice delivery mechanisms.