BELLY OF THE BEAST Book Drive
Belly of the Beast is partnering with the Prisoners Literature Project to provide books to people inside prisons. The PLP gets about a thousand letters a month from people who are incarcerated all over the US requesting books on all kinds of subjects, and sends out about 25,000 books a year. The books on this list have been compiled with input from people in prison, community partners and allies. Books bought to donate can be sent to Bruno/PLP at 976 60th Street, Oakland, CA 94608. View our wishlist and buy books to donate at the link below.
Recommended Reading
In addition, we've just released the Belly of the Beast Free World Reading List. With input from people in prison, community partners and allies, dive deeper with these recommended books, articles and podcasts.
Books
Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis
Fatal Invention: How Science, Politics, and Big Business Re-Create Race in the Twenty-First Century by Dorothy Roberts
Golden Gulag: Prisons, Surplus, Crisis, and Opposition in Globalizing California by Ruth Wilson Gilmore
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
Inside This Place, Not of It: Narratives from Women's Prisons - Robin Levi, Ayelet Waldman (Editors), Michelle Alexander (Foreword by)
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Brian Stevenson
Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty by Dorothy Roberts
Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington
Policing the Womb: Invisible Women and the Criminalization of Motherhood by Michele Goodwin
Reproductive Justice: An Introduction by Loretta Ross, Rickie Solinger
The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
The Purpose of Power: How We Come Together When We Fall Apart by Alicia Garza
The Temple of My Familiar by Alice Walker
Three Generations, No Imbeciles: Eugenics, the Supreme Court, and Buck v. Bell by Paul A. Lombardo
Articles
“California bans coerced sterilization of female inmates” by Corey Johnson, The Center for Investigative Reporting
“Female prison inmates sterilized illegally, California audit confirms” by Corey Johnson, The Center for Investigative Reporting
“Female inmates sterilized in California prisons without approval” by Corey Johnson, The Center for Investigative Reporting
“Immigrants Say They Were Pressured Into Unneeded Surgeries” by Caitlin Dickerson, Seth Freed Wessler and Miriam Jordan, The New York Times
“The Case for Reparations” by Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Atlantic
“The Long, Disgraceful History of American Attacks on Brown and Black Women’s Reproductive Systems” by Natasha Lennard, The Intercept
POdcasts
Black Girls’ Guide to Surviving Menopause
Finding Our Way with Prentis Hemphill
Films
Between the World and Me, Dir. Kamilah Forbes
La Operación, Dir. Ana María García
No Más Bebés, Dir. Renee Tajima