Turned Inside-Out magazine complete!

Katie D.

June 16, 2010 - 8:31 PM

Announcing the release of Turned Inside-Out, a publication of literature, art, and testimony from the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program at the University of Oregon!

If you haven't read about the process and history of this magazine, please read my previous blogs:

Inside-Out Publication

Thesis and Insideout Publication Updates

The magazine has been distributed to the previous participants in Inside-Out at the University of Oregon, and to the Inside participants at the Oregon State Penitentiary. It has also been sent to Inside-Out Instructors across the country, and will be used for recruitment, development, and fund raising across the country. It is something I am immensely proud of, and which has been a joy to work on. This was the most important project of my college career, and something I will cite forever as a formative experience and something I believe to be immensely important in my development as a writer, student, leader, and advocate for social justice in the world.

I'm including several pictures of individual pages of the magazine. It will soon be available on the Honors College website in pdf form, and I will be sure to alert everyone as soon as that happens.

For now, here's a press release I wrote to publicize the magazine, complete with ideology and program background:

The Robert D. Clark Honors College, in partnership with the national Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program, is celebrating the release of the magazine Turned Inside-Out, a collection of essays, artwork, and testimony by students of the Inside-Out Program: Honors College students and inmates at the Oregon State Penitentiary.

The Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program is a national education program based at Temple University that brings together college students and inmates of correctional institutions for integrated dialogue-based courses. These classes are offered at more than one hundred institutions across the country, and involve thousands of individuals each year. This publication includes letters of testimony, artistic pieces, and student essays examining the five texts studied during three years of Inside-Out classes at the Oregon State Penitentiary through the University of Oregon's Robert D. Clark Honors College. They were literature classes examining novels by Fyodor Dostoevsky and philosophy by Emmanuel Levinas taught by Distinguished Professor of English, Dr. Steven Shankman.

Turned was coedited by two University of Oregon students: Katie D. and Madeline, and one Inside student, James, who is incarcerated at OSP. Their intention for the publication is to showcase the academic and artistic talent of their classmates (both Inside and Outside) and to document the powerful transformative experiences participants routinely report. Students often report that Inside-Out classes are among the best offered at the University of Oregon, and challenge them intellectually and formatively to interact with the text on an intimate level and to explore their own preconceptions about society and academic study.

The founder and National Director of the Inside-Out Program, Lori Pompa, writes that "In a most unlikely setting, Inside-Out provides a space of liberation, a place in which each person is recognized and celebrated for the unique contribution that he or she brings to the whole." David Frank, the Dean of the Clark Honors College, adds that "The Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program demonstrates that higher education and the liberal arts can serve as forces of enlightenment and liberation." These leaders at the local and national level have encouraged undergraduate students on the Inside and Outside to challenge themselves, learn in new ways, and to work together. This publication is a model for what can come of transformative education of this scope and caliber.

In his introduction to Turned, Professor Shankman writes: "Over the more than thirty years of my academic career, I've had the privilege of teaching literature at a number of fine universities, including Stanford, Princeton, Columbia, Harvard, and the University of Oregon. My most memorable and transformative classes, however, have been taught at none of these esteemed institutions, but rather at the Oregon State Penitentiary. Once you read the selections in this publication, I think you'll see why."

A University of Oregon student stated that "Inside-Out was one of the most valuable experiences I have ever had. It exposed me to realities that are largely ignored in this country and forced me to develop a stronger sense of self. It was a rare opportunity to interact on a deep level with people in completely different situations than my own. If everyone would interact directly with the "Other" this country would be a very different place.

An Inside student of this class wrote "In attempting to explain the Inside-Out class, I realize how few words I truly know. "Awesome, life-changing, hope-inspiring," cover just a part of the experience. I learned from the books we studied, and from my fellow classmates. I wasn't judged for where I lived or my past. I was given the opportunity to be me, to learn, to grow, and gain friendships and memories that will last a lifetime."

These classes represent the best in liberal arts education: the opportunity to step outside our normal habits and preconceptions in order to fully experience the breadth of the world. Many of the Inside student have continued to take college courses while incarcerated, and have become increasingly involved with creative writing and artistic efforts as well. Outside students have gone on to work for Teach for America, to volunteer for peace initiatives abroad, and to work for the expansion of education within prisons. While still at the University of Oregon, Inside-Out students have distinguished themselves as members of the university community, including a student body president and a member of the 2010 Oregon Six. Several won awards for excellence in undergraduate research. This publication showcases the work and transformation of dedicated students, both inside and outside, who are willing to enter into dialogue with one another and to be profoundly changed. The editors of the magazine invite you to celebrate this publication with us for the achievement that it is: the celebration of undergraduate work, undertaken in partnership across social boundaries.