A core group of students on the Documenting Criminalization and Confinement team has finished a key project as part of their work on “confronting conditions of confinement.”
The project, published in August, is a multi-media, interactive StoryMap that documents the origins, events of, and implications of, the 2016 uprising of incarcerated persons at a maximum security prison known as Kinross in Kinchloe, MI in the Upper Peninsula.
The team conducted detailed and immersive research, says co-PI Heather Thompson: “The researchers went to the UP, took GoPro video of the trip to orient viewers of their StoryMap to what it feels like for families of incarcerated persons to have a loved one locked up so far away.” What’s more, says Thompson, the students “talked to the townspeople where the prison sits and took photos of its environs. They spoke with lawyers, guards, union officials, politicians; [they] combed newspapers, legal records, and more to flesh out this story.”
According to Thompson, the comprehensive StoryMap is one part of a longer research commitment. “Their deep diving into ‘what really happened at Kinross’ will continue, and they are writing an article for the anniversary of this event.”
The StoryMap team members are Alex Burnett, Ally Moralez, Julia Reinach, Nina Rosenberg, Anya Satyawadi, and Ava Wells. The team gives special thanks to Jamie Hein.
Many other students contributed to the Kinross uprising study. Students in the DAAS in Action class whose initial research and writing got the project off the ground include Oluwakemi Dauda, Ruth Dewit, Samantha Havela, Lily Johnston, Trinity Kelso, Izzie Kenhard, Ashley King, Allyson Moralez, Anisa Panahi, Elena Rauch, Julia Reinach, Anya Satyawadi, Rochelle Sims, Emily Sultan, and Mohammed Zakyi.