Join us on Friday, June 20th for a book talk and signing with author Emile Suotonye DeWeaver, for the release of his first book titled Ghost in the Criminal Justice Machine: Reform, White Supremacy and an Abolitionist Future.

DeWeaver during his twenty-one years in prison, DeWeaver covertly organized to pass legislation impacting juveniles in California’s criminal legal system; was a culture writer for Easy Street Magazine; and co-founded Prison Renaissance, an organization centering incarcerated voices and incarcerated leadership. DeWeaver draws on these experiences to interrogate the central premise of reform efforts, including prisoner rehabilitation programs, arguing that they demand self-abnegation, entrench white supremacy, and ignore the role of structural oppression.

“Incarceration helped me to develop as an artist only in the regard that the more deeply you are oppressed,” writes DeWeaver, “the more clearly you see the mechanisms of oppression and how they function without all of the window dressing.”

Emile Suotonye DeWeaver is a formerly incarcerated activist, widely published essayist, owner of Re:Frame LLC, and a 2022 Soros Justice Fellow. California’s Governor Brown commuted his life sentence after twenty-one years for his community work. He has written for publications including the San Francisco Chronicle, The San Jose Mercury News, Colorlines, The Appeal, The Rumpus, and Seventh Wave. He lives in Oakland, California.