What Will Happen to Me is a remarkable photo-textual book about children of the incarcerated and their caregivers, with portraits by Howard Zehr and interviews with children conducted by Lorraine Stutzman Amstutz.
Howard Zehr and Lorraine Stutzman Amstutz, professors at Eastern Mennonite University, have created a remarkable photo-textual book of children of the incarcerated and their caregivers. Howard Zehr (‘grandfather of restorative justice’ and an internationally renowned photographer) provided the beautiful portraits, and Lorraine Stutzman Amstutz (social worker and restorative justice mediator) provided the text from interviews she conducted with the children.
With funding from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Howard and Lorraine traveled the nation, photographing the children and caregivers, interviewing the children, and now giving us an opportunity to know these families in such a direct and wonderful way. Additionally, they have written on the role of restorative justice and reconciliation processes in the pursuit of family justice in a compelling and gentle way that should guide us all.
The publisher, Good Books, is offering a pre-ordering opportunity that if a sufficient volume of pre-orders were to come in, would greatly reduce the cost of the books, and further, would permit the inclusion of the ordering organization on the back of the book. The books can be resold at a profit, if desired (for example, as a fundraiser), but cannot be resold to a retail bookstore. Their goal is to place this book in the hands of families, parents inside, providers, policy makers, and funders, with the hopes of making all of us more aware of these children and families among us, and how they must cope with stigma, shame, and loss of contact.
If you wish to order, or have questions, please contact Dee Ann Newell at 501-366-3647 or deeannlr@yahoo.com. The pre-order deadline is January 31, 2010, but we would love to hear sooner in order to determine the volume of orders, thus the costs to you.
Downloads available from the book:
- Children of Prisoners (Book Cover) (PDF)
- Six Simple Steps to Participate in Coalition (PDF)
- Coalition Proposal for Utilizing “What Will Happen to Me?” (PDF)
To read about past spotlights, visit the spotlight archive.