To Say Their Own Word: Eddie Conway's prison organizing | Rattling the Bars

Published: April 17, 2023, 6:02 p.m.

b'Click here to read the transcript

Even though he was framed for the killing of a local police officer, sentenced without a fair trial, and imprisoned for 44 years, former Black Panther and dearly departed TRNN Executive Producer Marshall \\u201cEddie\\u201d Conway never stopped organizing. In 1980, while incarcerated himself as a political prisoner, Eddie helped organize a prisoners\\u2019 educational outreach program called \\u201cTo Say Their Own Word,\\u201d which brought thinkers and scholars to Maryland Penitentiary to speak about topics like US fascism, capitalism, the prison-industrial complex, government surveillance, and many other issues that have become even more pressing today. Through their organizing work, Eddie and his fellow inmates were responsible for dramatically increasing literacy levels among prisoners inside the Maryland Penitentiary and transforming the lives of countless inmates.

This special edition of Rattling the Bars features a mini-documentary that lays out an oral history of the \\u201cTo Say Their Own Word\\u201d program, with testimonies from Beth Saunders, Dominique Conway, Saleem El-Amin, Mansa Musa, and Gerald Dent. This mini-documentary, produced as part of a collaborative partnership between The Real News Network, UMBC Special Collections, and the Baltimore Field School, will be screened publicly at the TRNN studio in Baltimore on Wednesday, April 26, 2023.

Studio/Post-Production: Cameron Granadino

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