SEICHE Center Spring Seminar Series: Dr. John Eason, "In Our Backyard: How the Prison Boom Transformed America"

On April 22nd, 11 AM - 12 PM ET, the SEICHE Center for Health & Justice will host Dr. John Eason as part of our spring seminar series. Dr. Eason's presentation is titled "In Our Backyard: How the Prison Boom Transformed America."

Professor John Eason is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a member of UB's inaugural Center for Diversity Innovation's Distinguished Visiting Scholar cohort for 2020-21. His research interest challenges existing models and develops new theories of community, health, race, punishment, and rural/urban processes in several ways. By tracing the emergence of the rural ghetto he establishes a new conceptual model of rural neighborhoods. These relationships are explored through his book, Big House on the Prairie: Rise of the Rural Ghetto and Prison Proliferation, at the University of Chicago Press. As the Founder and Director of the UW Justice Lab, we focus on reducing/ending racial, economic, and health disparities across the rural-urban interface by critically examining the causes of spatial inequality and offering creative solutions to address these issues. The UW Justice Lab incorporates a vertical integration model of mentorship including affiliated faculty, graduate students, and undergraduates across multiple research projects including Peeking Behind the Veil: Investigating Health and Violence in U.S. Immigrant Detention Centers and the COVID in Confined Spaces funded through the National Science Foundation.

This event will be moderated by Callie Ginapp, a third-year medical student at Yale School of Medicine. She has a BS in Biology and a Certificate in Clinical and Translational Science from the University of Iowa. She grew up on a farm in rural Iowa and is a first-generation college student. Her research focuses include addiction medicine and post-incarceration health, specifically on the relationship between financial debt and health outcomes after release.

The event is co-sponsored by the Office of Communications at Yale School of Medicine and the Department of African American Studies at Yale University.