Linda Ross Meyer, Sentencing in Time (Amherst College Press, 2017)
If you look at the history of punishment (at least in the West), what you\u2019ll see is that we\u2019ve gone from a penal regime that used (inter alia) physical violence\u2014whipping, beating, branding, amputation, and killing\u2014to one that uses confinement. It is a mark of our \u201ccivility\u201d that we no longer \u201churt\u201d people to get them to do what we want; instead, we put them in jails and prisons. We sentence them to \u201cdo time,\u201d that time being a period of confinement away from, well, pretty much everybody.\n\nIn her thought-provoking book\xa0Sentencing in Time (Amherst College Press, 2017),\xa0Linda Ross Meyer\xa0examines \u201cdoing time.\u201d What, she asks, does it really mean to \u201cdo time\u201d and does \u201cdoing time\u201d really do what we say it does? Her answers are, to say the least, disturbing. \u201cDoing time\u201d means being sentenced to meaninglessness (something humans don\u2019t like at all) and, no, it really doesn\u2019t do much good at all beyond removing potential malefactors from our midst for a period of time\u2014no \u201creforming\u201d is really accomplished. Her conclusion: the current penal regime, insofar as it is inhumane and ineffective, is badly broken.\n\nBy the way, this is an open-access book. You can get it for free here.\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices\nSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/law