michael walker indefinite

[Intro] Indefinite: Doing Time in Jail (what is it?)

Michael L. Walker (2022). An 'organic ethnography' of life as a resident in the Golden County (pseudonym) jail system, built on field notes from roughly 134 days in jail (a 180-day sentence, 120 with good time, plus earlier stints). Studies jail culture 'from the inside out.'

[Intro] Main goal/argument of Indefinite

Treat social life in jail as worthy of study in its own right: residents' rules, values and ways of organizing are solutions to problems of jail time ('culture in action'), not pathologies. Jail is a type of organization, and in the end all a resident can hope to do is endure.

[Intro] Palace de Excreta

Walker's name for the safety (suicide-watch) cell he was put in at intake: a 10' x 10' empty box smeared with feces, no bed/toilet/sink, a floor grate for a toilet, a Velcro nylon gown instead of a uniform. He was shamed, degraded and confused there, and he felt cut off from the social world.

[Intro] Why was Walker put in the Palace de Excreta?

At intake he pointed to the 'no history of mental illness' box on the form and said it shouldn't have been checked. Asked if he might be a danger to himself or others, he said 'I don't know what I might do.' Deputies stripped him and put him in the safety cell. He thinks they were saying 'we know how to handle guys like you.'

[Intro] How did Walker get out of the Palace?

Two Dept. of Mental Health visits: a young woman gave a one-size-fits-all survey, then said 'It doesn't matter' and left. An older Black woman ('auntie energy') told him to tell the psychiatrist he was better. He told the psychiatrist he wanted to live and was released. No follow-up mental healthcare after housing assignment.

[Intro] Live feed (Intro)

After leaving the Palace, Walker saw a control panel with a live feed of the cell: all his debasements (singing, wrist-gnawing, nakedness) could have been on display to deputies and passing residents. No one ever intervened. Shows surveillance without care.

[Intro] Liminal place-time (Intro)

Because deputies sent Walker to the Palace before intake was finished, he had no booking number or wristband, so he was 'not formally anywhere' and his jail time had not officially started.

[Intro] Why was Walker arrested on his birthday?

Feb 7, 2008 (his 31st birthday): he went to the courthouse to set up a payment plan for old traffic tickets. Charges from an earlier arrest (on university property) had been changed and a warrant issued, so deputies arrested him in the waiting area. He later took a plea deal: 180 days (120 with good time).

[Intro] Mutual objectification (courthouse clerk)

Walker's opening example: the clerk never looked up and treated him as a form to fill in; Walker saw the clerk as 'the government clerk,' a social object (like at the DMV). Both objectified each other, foreshadowing Chapter 1's argument about objectification.

[Intro] Total institution (Goffman)

A walled place where barriers between spheres of social life (sleep, work, play) are more or less destroyed and all activities occur in one place under a rationalized plan. Walker felt the Palace was a total institution unto itself. Goffman's Asylums also told Walker he could do meaningful research in jail.

[Intro] Jails vs. prisons: admissions numbers

In 2019 state and federal prisons admitted 530,900 people. Jails admitted over 10 million people every year 2005-2018 (13.6 million in 2008). Jails process about 1 in 30 Americans each year. Everyone in prison has done jail time, but not everyone in jail goes to prison.

[Intro] Flow of the criminal justice system (Intro)

Arrest, then jail, and if a conviction brings a sentence over a year, in most cases you 'do' that time in prison.

[Intro] Prison chauvinism

Scholars and the public lump jails in with prisons; far more studies of prisons exist. The most important jail work (Goldfarb, Spradley, Irwin) is 35+ years old and never became 'jail studies.' Walker compares it to lumping high schools in with colleges.

[Intro] Average length of stay in jail

26 days. Walker says it conceals more than it reveals: some people are in for years fighting a case, and 26 days is enough for harm to occur (his Palace stay was within three days).

[Intro] Jail deaths and suicide statistics (2006-2016)

16,962 deaths in jails: 40% within the first 7 days; about 31% were suicides, at a median of 9 days in jail. Only 1% of suicides were in Palace-type units; 47% in general population housing. 70%+ (76% in 2016) of those who died by suicide were unconvicted ('innocent until proven guilty'). Suicide is the leading cause of jail death, then heart disease.

[Intro] Unconvicted jail population

The largest subpopulation in American jails for 40+ years is people who have not been convicted (65% in 2017). Continuances and overwhelmed courts make the right to a speedy trial little more than an ideal; they can do indefinite time and are often the core that gives jail life its culture.

[Intro] Grab and hold policy

Walker's tongue-in-cheek proposal: randomly grab judges, defense attorneys, prosecutors, legislators, law enforcement and correctional officers and hold them in a jail away from home for 18 hours to a month, to see who cares about justice when they could face the Palace.

[Intro] Why 18 hours to a month in the grab and hold policy?

Because if you know you can get out after 18 hours, you get your hopes up, and the knife twists when actual time exceeds expected time.

[Intro] Reincarceration statistics

68% of formerly incarcerated persons are reincarcerated within 3 years of release, 79% within 6 years, and 83% within 9 years.

[Intro] Organic ethnography

Ethnography that evolves from the researcher's own unplanned immersion (Walker was arrested first, then studied it) and is grounded in experience and emotion. Goes beyond Goffman's Asylums by presenting the emotional content of the social world and the author's emotional stance.

[Intro] Five practices of organic ethnography

(1) Focus on experience and structure; (2) emotions as a principal pathway to understanding; (3) conversations used as interviews/fact-finding (no formal interviews); (4) paired field notes; (5) three-dimensional writing.

[Intro] Paired field notes

One set of personal notes (feelings, 'Michael the person,' family, anger/admiration of residents) and one set of sociological notes (social structure, stratification, status hierarchy, masculine narratives). Experiences that fit both went in both. Written with golf pencils on commissary pads.

[Intro] Three-dimensional writing / psychic distance

Walker switches between three voices: Michael the subject, narrator, and sociologist. Using John Gardner's 'psychic distance' (how close the reader feels to events), he varies distance: wide for analysis (e.g., objectification with the clerk), none for his thoughts, middling for narration.

[Intro] Why Walker says 'resident' instead of 'inmate' or 'prisoner'

Those terms are married to prisons and carry connotations. 'Resident' acknowledges that people live in jail the way they do in military academies and monasteries, and links jail to hospitals and other organizations (not fetishizing the setting).

[Intro] Jail as a type of organization (analogies)

Walker toggles between jail details and analogies to hospitals, military academies, monasteries, and to people battling cancer or poverty, who share extremes of uncertainty and time (making the immediate more important than the unknowable future).

[Intro] County tour

Residents' term for being shuffled between housing units and jails (to quell fights, head off conflicts, and, per lore, earn money). Gave Walker chances to interact with residents of other racial groups and with different levels of jail experience.

[Intro] Walker's research limits (classification)

Deputies classified residents by risk and informally by race. Walker's data reflect his racial classification ('black') and life in general population housing; he had minimal interaction with residents outside GENPOP or with other racial groups (except via the county tour, court/mental health holding cells, etc.).

[Intro] Criminalblackman (Katheryn Russell-Brown)

A single word because 'criminal,' 'Black,' and 'man' fuse into one terrifying image of crime, a myth dating back to Reconstruction. Walker worried about it and about Devah Pager's Marked (that his race plus record would make academia see him as too risky).

[Intro] Walker's worries about writing the book

Self-exploitation, how his family would see him, whether he could do the experiences justice, whether academia would take him seriously ('the jail guy'), and avoiding a Hollywood story of a Black man redeemed by a White savior.

[Intro] Why isn't the book a chronology/process?

Walker says 'process' needs an identifiable sequence of steps toward a goal; observing change between time 1 and 2 is not process. Jail time was not a neat arc (no 'careers'). Chapters submerge the reader in the emotional muck of jail life instead.

[Intro] Book structure: Part 1 vs Part 2

Part 1 = social structure (Ch.1 objectification/intake; Ch.2 reps; Ch.3 race and 'the politics'; Ch.4 cool deps vs asshole deps; Ch.5 in-custody court). Part 2 = feelings/culture (Ch.6 jail culture in action; Ch.7 time; Ch.8 sleep; Ch.9 care; Ch.10 'it is what it is' / 'it is as it should be').

[Intro] Walker's mentors in the Intro

Scott Brooks told him 'Gotta write it up' after his first arrest. Ellen Reese urged him to 'pay attention' in jail, chaired his dissertation, wrote, sent money and visited, and mailed Goffman's Asylums. Edna Bonacich and Jane Ward also helped (letters/books).

[Intro] The Intro's key sentence about how jail makes things happen

Walker tries to avoid saying 'jail makes people do X' (anthropomorphizing jail). He tells who specifically did what, or speaks of 'jail time' having effects, because residents respond to time as a 'thing.'

[Ch1] Objectification (Ch.1 core argument)

Intake is a production line in which deputies systematically destroy personhood and replace it with a single social object: 'the criminal.' Objectification is a theory of value: social objects have very little value, so mistreating them needs no justification. 'If you're in here, you did something.'

[Ch1] Social object / 'the criminal'

A kind of social object essentialized in terms of its uses or motives. 'The criminal' is a bundle of motives to do harm, lie and steal (compare 'the slut,' a collection of body parts for a man's use). Not to be trusted, invested in or cared for.

[Ch1] Why objectification is not passive

There are payoffs: reduce a person to uses or motives and those justify themselves; abuse occurs without moral quandaries because you are not dealing with 'actual people.' The onus falls on the devalued to explain why they shouldn't be mistreated.

[Ch1] 'If you're in here, you did something.'

A deputy's matter-of-fact words that opened Ch.1: in jail accusations are treated as true. Differs from police stops (implicit accusation of nonspecific guilt) because it confers guilt as fact and becomes grounds for what will be done to you next.

[Ch1] Martha Stewart example (Ch.1)

Not everyone charged with or found guilty of a crime is deemed 'a criminal' (nobody calls Martha Stewart that). Blameworthiness, honor, esteem, dignity and respect map onto race, class and gender, so the more marginal you are, the more vulnerable to accusations of guilt.

[Ch1] 'Every inmate either has AIDS or is trying to kill you'

What Walker's cousin (a correctional officer in a northern California prison) was taught in training. Example of how the criminal is treated as a dangerous object; connects to staff choosing punishment over care.

[Ch1] Care vs. punishment (Ch.1)

Penal organizations are mandated to provide basic care as well as punish, but too often staff choose punishment over mental/physical healthcare, sometimes with deadly results.

[Ch1] Deaths Walker cites as consequences of objectification

Terrill Thomas (killed by Milwaukee deputies in 2016, denied water for 7 days); Kalief Browder (Rikers; suicide attempts then death after release without being found guilty); Gregory Lloyd Edwards (2018, Brevard County, FL); Andrew Holland (died of pulmonary embolism after 46 hours in a restraint chair, San Luis Obispo County).

[Ch1] Production line metaphor (intake)

Residents are the 'raw materials' moving through stations until the product (a resident with a booking number) is complete. Deputies wear black nitrile gloves to avoid contamination from handling them. Pace is hurry-up and rough, with bullying commands that teach residents to expect degradation.

[Ch1] Order of intake stations

Red line and frisk (nose to the wall, shoes/socks/belt in a brown paper bag) → property desk (inventory, money to commissary, rushed screening form) → uniform station → drop clothes at property lock-up → fingerprinting (bottleneck) → final station (booking number, tattoo photos, mugshot, wristband) → pre-housing holding.

[Ch1] The red line

A line running through intake and hallways: 'stand inside the red line, nose to the wall.' Intake happens in bunches ('we,' not 'you'), starting depersonalization. Residents must stay inside it when moved.

[Ch1] Penal posture

Walking and standing with fingers interlaced (hands clasped), which bows the head and gives an impression of being broken. With relentless reminders residents adopt it automatically, even when deputies aren't around.

[Ch1] Property desk screening

Deputy fills in most of the form without discussion; mental health/sexual risk screening serves an organizational mandate more than any intervention, with too little time to read before signing. (Walker later challenged a box at this desk and ended up in the Palace.)

[Ch1] Uniform as 'identity kit' (Goffman)

Free-world clothing signals prestige, subculture and blameworthiness. The county oranges replace personal selfhood with a stigmatizing uniform that hides charges and circumstances of arrest and insists you are guilty ('The damned thing wears you').

[Ch1] Wristband / booking number

Photo + info laminated on a wristband: 'from persons known by name to objects known by number.' Needed for visitation, church, mail, rec, commissary and clothing exchange. Booking number starts with admission year plus a running count; Walker saw one that showed a man had been in jail nine years pending adjudication (199916XXX).

[Ch1] Polite indifference

Feigned interest masking a deputy's determination to get through a shift without addressing every need: 'I'll see what I can do,' or pointing to a mythical other deputy who is responsible. Example: a man begging for a missed meal. In housing units it mixes with condescension and disregard; in pre-housing holding disregard is more common.

[Ch1] Pre-housing holding cells (features)

Cold, dirty temporary cells where newbies wait for classification and a race-specific bed (hours to days; one man said day three). Newbies don't know what they're waiting for, obsess about time, ruminate about family and responsibilities, call bail bondsmen from payphones (corkboard of cards), and feel acutely vulnerable to uncertainty ('hurry up and wait').

[Ch1] Pre-housing holding as a place with different norms (key evidence)

Residents shared space, food ('Shoot it!'), and advice across race, age and experience; no fights or antagonism; like a medical waiting room. Walker uses this to show that race relations were not inevitable or intractable, challenging the institutional myth used to justify racial classification.

[Ch1] 'Shoot it!'

What the first resident to holler says to claim a newbie's unwanted food (skim milk, sandwiches) in pre-housing holding; meaning 'pass it over.'

[Ch1] Newbies vs. experienced residents

Experienced residents have more cultural competence (culture = what people do in the situations that confront them): eat jail coleslaw, make eye contact, speak clearly, sleep (even snore), use slang ('oranges,' 'spread'), may have a V-shaped gymnast build, and use the toilet in culturally competent ways (flush continuously, 'float one; soak one').

[Ch1] Classification (Ch.1)

Process after pre-housing holding using attributes (marital status, race, criminal history, charges) to predict misconduct; goals are safety or treatment. In a whispered interview deputies ask about sexual orientation, gangs, threats and 'Do you get along with all races?' Residents aren't told their classification; they learn on arrival.

[Ch1] ADSEG (administrative segregation)

Jail within jail: solitary confinement, 23.5-hour lockdown, no phones, no visits; marked by a red band on waist chains. Reasons include fights, pruno, or water bags for curls. Also used for people who answer 'No' to getting along with all races.

[Ch1] PC (protective custody)

Housing for residents needing protection from others: snitches/testifiers, ex-gang members, people with sex-based charges, and those who 'PC up'. Marked by blue bands. Hated ('snitches and baby rapers'); must 'debrief' to get PC; a standing 'green light' means anyone can attack them on sight. PCs formed the '2-5' gang (peceta = 25-cent coin; SNY = sensitive needs yard).

[Ch1] GENPOP (general population)

The largest classification, a catch-all for residents who don't fit elsewhere (including white supremacists and people with murder or DV charges). Most of the book analyzes GENPOP.

[Ch1] Trustees (greens)

Most privileged class: need a scheduled release date and a jail job (kitchen, laundry, etc.). Wear green tops and bottoms; housed together with better creature comforts. Walker asked for trustee placement at classification and called the Providence trustee pod the easiest time he did.

[Ch1] Red band example (Deputy Brown)

Young Black resident with a bruised eye and red band: he rushed a man he had a Youth Authority beef with and said 'Fightin'.' Deputy Brown explained ADSEG as 'if I put him in the cell with you, he would jack your shit up.'

[Ch2] Rep

A GENPOP resident chosen by their racial group (not by deputies) who polices social behavior in the housing unit, performs caretaking for their racial group, and filters information between deputies and residents. Likely short for 'race representative.' The role is held at the pleasure of deputies, who give reps privileges.

[Ch2] Mediating management model

An administrative system where managers rely on mediators from the subordinate group to reduce the workload of managing subordinates. Mediators filter information, mediate competing interests and police subordinates (sometimes with violence). In jail: deputies (management) → reps (mediators) → GENPOP residents in three racial groups. Mediators don't get promoted into management; the role is terminal.

[Ch2] Examples of mediators outside jail (Walker)

The kapo, the class president, the 'house nigga,' and a university department chair. Each makes managing subordinates easier for the manager but never promotes into management.

[Ch2] Three racial classifications in Golden County jails

'Blacks' (includes Black and Asian Americans, e.g., a Nigerian American celled with a Vietnamese American), 'southsiders' (sureños: non-gang Latinos, gang-affiliated homies, Indios, paisas), and 'woods' (peckerwoods: Whites, divided ideologically into non-affiliated and white power 'comrades'). Based on organizational convenience, not security.

[Ch2] Why only three racial groups?

Organizational convenience from resource limits, not free-society racial categories or security. Deputies just looked at residents and decided. With larger populations of Hmong or Middle Eastern men there might have been fourth and fifth categories.

[Ch2] Southsiders, paisas, Indios, woods subgroups

Under the Mexican Mafia in jail, southsider gangs unite even if they're rivals in free society ('Are you a homie?'). Paisas = recent Latino immigrants (pseudo-slur: poor, rural). Indios = members of nearby Indian nations. Woods = Whites (comrades give Sieg Heil salutes). Whiteness left untouched while groups of color were aggregated (Mills' Racial Contract).

[Ch2] Golden County admission demographics (2008)

Over 1.5 million admitted on felony and misdemeanor charges: 41.2% Latino, 35.2% White, 17.4% Black, 6.2% 'other' (including Asian and American Indian).

[Ch2] Open vs. closed housing units

Open (tanks/dorms; e.g., Providence 16D): one big room with three-high bunks, tables, shared toilets/showers/phones, entered via a bar gate. Closed (pods like Sunland's Z-Pod): two-person cells (about 11' x 7') around a dayroom with a command pod; a single deputy can lock/unlock cells, speak on the intercom, and control phones/lights. Placement was by chance; neither better.

[Ch2] Backstage in jail

Neither open nor closed units offered a Goffmanian backstage: you can't hide when you use the toilet, drink water, have a nightmare or feel emotionally drained. Open units mean never alone but feeling especially alone; closed means a celly's smells communicate with yours.

[Ch2] Kite

A written message or request to deputies (a palm-sized 'blue slip' medical form or scrap paper) passed through the runner or doorjamb. In closed units reps screened them first.

[Ch2] Pod roles: pod primary vs. runner

Pod primary sits at the command pod controls; the runner walks the tiers doing security checks, delivering/collecting mail and kites. Residents beg the runner for needs.

[Ch2] Race-conscious bed assignments

Dayrooms were racially integrated, but deputies assigned beds so all residents in a bunk stack or cell were the same racial group (celly always same classification). Residents waited in pre-housing for race-specific bed space ('just waiting on another Black guy to make bail?' 'Pretty much').

[Ch2] Racialization

The association of persons, places, things and activities with racial categories (e.g., 'Black people don't ski'). Creating racial categories creates normative boundaries; each group's claim for itself is a claim against other groups. In jail: 'black phone,' 'wood tables.'

[Ch2] Divide et impera (Ch.2 title section)

Latin 'divide and rule.' Deputies introduced race as a way of structuring life (racialization of space/amenities) which gave them the mediating management model, making GENPOP units easier to manage.

[Ch2] Institutional myth (racial classification)

Penal administrators' belief that racial classification is vital to security because interracial conflict is intractable. Walker: evidence contradicts it (no interracial conflict in pre-housing holding) and classification increased the likelihood and severity of violence; deputies used it for efficient management instead.

[Ch2] Deputy's justification for relying on reps

A pod deputy said 170 to 180 inmates are 'on their button,' phones ring, people con you, so 'everyone just gets a No.' Walker: this explains how deputies used reps to manage residents.

[Ch2] Three ways to become a rep

(1) By default (Hacksaw, the lone wood in 16D, handed the role to the next wood). (2) Informal committee/discussion (Black residents discussing replacing D-Double: 'Somebody smart,' Toll reluctant, LK eager). (3) By appointment (Listo appointed celly Beast; Beast appointed Reaper). Deputies had no input, since an appointed rep would lack legitimacy.

[Ch2] What makes an effective rep

A 'diplomat-warrior' with jail cultural competence, legitimacy within his racial group (so others can be organized to enforce rules), and no empty threats. Walker cites Chief Justice Roberts: 'you hold the reins of power, but if you tug on them too tightly, you'll find out they're not attached to anything.'

[Ch2] Rep example: Carter (16D)

Black rep who gave Walker the 'orientation': which toilet/sink/shower and tables are 'ours,' and 'Don't cross between their tables' (Latino section). His complaint about skipping the newspaper ('I guess I'm gonna have to start whoopin' ass') was an empty threat, lowering Walker's respect for him.

[Ch2] Rep example: D-Double (Z-4)

Black rep in Sunland Z-4 in his 4th consecutive year ('Everybody is new to me'); kept information from others ('need to know basis'); arranged Chippy's removal and cell moves; not especially invested in succession because jail time is indefinite.

[Ch2] Rep example: Beast and Reaper (southsiders)

Beast: southsider rep, kind but sometimes sanctioned beatings. Reaper (his appointed successor) was stricter: southsiders had to do exercises 'to keep your wind up' and announce completion ('Gracias!' / 'A ti!'). Their influence shows appointment-style succession, with meetings per tier.

[Ch2] Three rep functions

Order maintenance, information filtering, and caretaking. Each came with privileges.

[Ch2] Social order (Walker's definition)

Interaction that is stable, regularized and patterned, so you can expect certain outcomes under certain conditions. It does not mean free of violence or conflict.

[Ch2] Functional violence

Violence in the service of maintaining social order (e.g., by reps), sometimes to avoid an incident report and more work for deputies, sometimes for informal rules of no benefit to deputies. The threat was more common and usually sufficient. Reps had latitude to police GENPOP as they saw fit.

[Ch2] DP ('get DP'ed')

To be violently disciplined for a rule violation (by a group or one talented fighter); a common intragroup order-maintenance tool in jail. Also used by gangs on the street.

[Ch2] Example: refusing southsider in Z-4

A southsider sat at tables and refused to follow deputies' commands; three deputies then called Beast and Reaper, asking 'Who's your rep? Who do I have to talk to?' When that failed they took him to the rec yard. He had been celled with Insincere, who had a green light for violent discipline. Shows deputies consulting the same men who sanctioned violence.

[Ch2] Example: Chippy

A new Black resident (chipped tooth) who stole a piece of candy from celly TJ. D-Double gave him a choice: roll out or get DP'ed. Chippy 'rolled out' via deputies to avoid lockdown risk to everyone; later boasted in court holding that he had turned the tables. Illustrates order maintenance and reps' influence over transfers.

[Ch2] Rolled out

Transferred out of a cell or housing unit, often arranged by a rep working with deputies (e.g., Chippy; Henry rolling out 'Michael Knight'). The average resident had little ability to get himself or others moved.

[Ch2] How an average resident could get moved

Only two options: tell deputies his wellbeing was threatened (naming who and why, risking PC or retaliation) or go through his rep, who must convince deputies removing someone ensures order. Walker initially assumed anyone could, until Bill's kite request showed otherwise.

[Ch2] Reps as mouthpieces (ventriloquist dummies)

Deputies called D-Double to the sally port, announced rules over the dayroom speaker, then made him repeat them to residents ('Eh y'all. They gonna give us extended dayroom'). Possibly also a way to demean reps and remind them they are still GENPOP.

[Ch2] Information sieves (reps filtering information)

Reps knew private information: D-Double knew how many letters Walker's celly received; Beast knew Walker's release date and said 'I check everyone's shit.' Reps shared news from deputies with only a few (competent residents, helpers) on a 'need to know basis,' and screened kites so only those the reps 'thought were cool' reached the runner.

[Ch2] Helpers

Jail-competent residents (Ken, Toll, Reaper, Tiny, Big Guapo) who act as an auxiliary to the rep when he has court, a health visit or doesn't feel like doing the job.

[Ch2] No-mode

Deputies responding to requests as if insincere or frivolous (especially in closed units with intercom buttons), putting the onus on residents to prove need. Pod announcement: 'Don't hit your buttons unless you are dying or we tell you to.' Walker once hit his button during movie night: 'Who's dying?'

[Ch2] 'Next shift' / mythical deputy

Typical deputy dodges, passing the work to the mythical deputy who never arrived. Also: runner refusing outgoing mail, which made Walker feel truly alone.

[Ch2] Example: Sisqo

Neighbor of Walker. Flushed apple cores (days using rec-yard toilet); asked for an indigent kit, got 'Do I look like your fucking nigger?' and 'Fuck that fish kit'; next shift's deputy said 'Who's your rep? I'm not your rep.' Shows deputies treating reps as responsible for residents' basic needs.

[Ch2] Indigent kit / fish kit

Banker's box with soap, toothbrush and toothpaste, razor, small deodorant, bit of shampoo, plus a document titled 'Inmate Orientations' (rights and responsibilities). Given in pre-housing; residents had to beg for new ones.

[Ch2] Caretaking by reps

Reps took over work deputies would otherwise do: roaming the dayroom, passing kites/messages, delivering books/newspapers/race-specific games and changing TV channels, counting group members for meal trays ('Trustees hit your goddamn buttons'), pouring hot water through a potato chip bag funnel under cell doors ('Jail Grubhub'), cleaning the dayroom ('servants of all').

[Ch2] Caretaking at a deputy's expense

Deputies regard caring for residents as the least desirable work, and if given the choice between care and punishment they choose punishment, so reps fill the gap (more so in closed dayrooms).

[Ch3] The Providence trustee pod (Ch.3)

Compared to GENPOP's 'working poor neighborhood,' a 'beautiful, gated community': 60+ residents, windows with sunlight and a view of State St., working clock, always-hot water, books/cards/checkers, calmer deputies, cell doors propped open, longer dayroom time, lights off after breakfast. No reps and no racial organization. Walker slept in a 'boat' between bunks with White cellie Casey and Latino cellie Alex ('racial Neapolitan ice cream').

[Ch3] Boat

A body-length, blue plastic, canoe-shaped sleeping apparatus used when a third person was in a two-man cell.

[Ch3] Lamont's explanation of the trustee pod

'We don't have that shit in other pods—that race shit. Mufuckas in here can do what they want. Just don't be disrespectful, but it's not about race.' Shows race wasn't used to organize social life there.