SSSP 2024 Annual Meeting
Date: Saturday, August 10
Time: 2:30 PM - 4:10 PM
SPECIAL
Session 072: Author Meets Critics: Murder Town, USA: Homicide, Structural Violence, and Activism in Wilmington by Yasser Arafat Payne, Brooklynn K. Hitchens, & Darryl L. Chambers, Rutgers University Press, 2023
Room: Salon 7
Sponsor: Program Committee
Organizer: Claire M. Renzetti, University of Kentucky
Presider: Jamie J. Fader, Temple University
Description: In their book, Murder Town, USA: Homicide, Structural Violence, and Activism in Wilmington, authors Yasser Payne, Brooklynn Hitchens, and Darryl Chambers, present their ethnographic study of the relationship between structural opportunity and violence in the city of Wilmington, Delaware. Through their engagement with city residents who were formerly involved with street activities and/or the criminal justice system, the authors provide a radical reconceptualization of violence in low-income Black communities, showing how involvement in violence and crime is a logical, "resilient" response to the perverse context of structural inequality. The authors will be joined by a panel of scholars who will engage in an insightful discussion of this important work.
Authors:
Yasser Arafat Payne, University of Delaware
Brooklynn K. Hitchens, University of Maryland
Darryl L. Chambers, Center for Structural Equity and University of Delaware
Critics:
Jamie J. Fader, Temple University
Anthony A. Peguero, Arizona State University
Louis Edgar Esparza, California State University, Los Angeles
Robert L. Peralta, The University of Akron