This year I have been on disability leave but a few articles I worked on in the past finally were able to be accepted and published. Here I give a very brief overview of this work!

As some of you know my PhD work revolved mostly around the institutions and people responsible for investigating reports of child maltreatment in the US. Over the years I have tried to make the connections between these child maltreatment-focused institutions and the criminal legal system more clear. 

In 2020 my friend Brianna Harvey and I suggested that the term “family policing” better described the role and relationships of these systems, from the perspective of those most impacted. Although my latest article “Family Policing and the Carceral State: How Carceral Violence Persists Through the Surveillance, Punishment, and Regulation of Families" was just published, it was written in late 2020 early 2021 to expound upon this sort of thought stream. Alan Dettlaff (Co-founder of UpEND) and I wrote the piece to begin chipping away at why this term was both unique and an extension of the existing literature. At the time of writing this, I was inspired by the types of mundane and routine carceral techniques Kohler-Haussmann discusses in Misdemeanorland.  This influenced how I thought about the articles subtopics of surveillance, regulation, and punishment.

Although my work has shifted and matured since writing this article, I believe it is a helpful piece to those still trying to learn about how our responses to child maltreatment in the US are entrenched in the carceral ecosystem (a word I use in addition to carceral state and refers to the imprisonment and enclosure of people), and importantly how they are part of a longer history of the transatlantic slave trade. 

Earlier this year, another piece I contributed to entitled “Unfortunately what’s right isn’t always what’s best”: Exploring teacher and school staff experiences with mandated reporting” dug into the more nuanced details of the family policing system, focusing on mandatory reporting and how it is both inadequate and riddled with uncomfortable nuances. Mandatory reporting laws across the US require that various professionals and workers report any suspected instances of child abuse or neglect. This article provides a brief policy overview of mandatory reporting, and then presents the results from the dataset (which included qualitative research— interviews with staff from three high schools in California). The article highlights three major themes: subjectivity of the decision to report, the absence of youth voices, and navigating inadequate systems of support. 

TLDR: Although mandatory reporting is mandated, many school staff struggle with deciding on whether or not to report due to the impact it has on youth, families, and even themselves as both reporters and supporters of said youth. The decision is made more complex and difficult due to staff not having trusted peers to discuss the risk versus benefit or reporting, and feeling like there were no other supports for youth and families for them to choose from, and feeling like there were few supports to help them bear the emotional weight of the trauma students would endure and disclose. Importantly throughout the process, the youth impacted themselves have little say in how the reporting and investigation process goes and can feel a sense of betrayal from the reporters. This is a great article to read if you want to learn more of the intricate personal details about one facet of the system, and why we desperately need different.

Lastly, my friend Rachel and I wrote a piece years ago, likely around 2020-2021 using her dissertation work. Rachel and I were both blessed to work closely with the Los Angeles Community Action Network, and she actually introduced me to the Stop LAPD Spying Coalition. Rachel and I had a difficult time writing this piece. I think it was because the format did not fit neatly into an academic journal. The piece is called “The Real Data Set’: A Case of Challenging Power Dynamics and Questioning the Boundaries of Research Production“ and is a reflective work on her ethnography. So although it is very much written traditionally as an original research piece, it is more a reflection and theoretical piece of sorts. I’m not sure, I’m still grappling with this! It refuses to be neatly disciplined.

This piece was approved by the ED of LACAN Pete White, and Rachel spent many years working with the org. The article is about approaches to "community-engaged" research. It disrupts the belief that just having community involvement is enough and refuses the notion that academic processes like the IRB are efficient. We state how community leaders are very much leaders all on their own. (Us two personally have learned so much from them). Community members research ideas, research methods, and other research approaches can and should influence and shape collaborative projects. The article gives examples of how LACAN disrupts the ivory towers process of engaged research, and provides examples or guidelines of what we can actually learn from a radical and different approach to these collaborations. This includes centering if not following (versus just including) community expertise, building long term relationships between community organizations and academic researchers centered on collective action, and having partnerships rooted in shared epistemologies and care values. Although my views have grown and matured since, I’m so grateful to have worked in this piece!

I hope you read and enjoy these pieces. All of them call for us to think differently about the status quo. I love my work and would love to return to it. However I am severely disabled, and I know the stress of doing this work and speaking against the academy and capitalism etc has wreaked havoc on my body. I would greatly appreciate if you subscribed for a membership on this website, or if you would do a one time donation. You can find both of these options in the toolbar (menu). Help me get back on my feet and get back to doing this great work.

Much love and happy holidays!

Vee