A look at role and reality of books behind bars. Focus on the work of Books 2 Prisoners Vancouver, who send free reading material inside to prisoners.
Emily Aspinwall, Stark Raven Media Collective
**This piece is self-contained, with an intro and extro**
Books play an intimate and educational role in many of our lives. This relationship fuels the passion a lot of us have for our public libraries.
For those incarcerated, access to good reading material is more of a challenge.
In prison in Canada, libraries, if they exist, are small and limited. There is sometimes little to read other than harlequin romance and religious materials.
In response, people on the outside have organized initiatives to help get books inside to prisoners.
One such initiative exists in Vancouver and is called Books 2 Prisoners.
Books 2 Prisoners (B2P) is a grassroots group of volunteers who send books inside.
Stark Raven speaks with B2P organizer and co-founder, Filis Iverson about what it is like trying to get books behind bars.
More on B2P: http://www.prisonjustice.ca/organizations/b2p.html books (at) prisonjustice.ca
========================================== STARK RAVEN MEDIA COLLECTIVE A closer look at prisons & criminalization ==========================================
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