Our Story
“We sorta made an unspoken pact over 25 years ago to just take care of each other, and we did it the whole time we were in prison and we continue to do it on the outside.”
–Aisha Elliott
BACKGROUND
Far too often and for far too long, women in prison have been defined and described by others -- the state, the media, and researchers -- with little knowledge of our lives or histories. Although women have constituted the fastest growing incarcerated population since the 1980s, in the context of the tremendous onslaught of mass incarceration, we have represented a numeric minority. As a result, the unique experiences and needs of women in the criminal legal system continue to be overlooked, ignored, and neglected. Likewise, our successes and triumphs have been dismissed and omitted from the historical record, and at times even appropriated as the achievements of others.
THE WOMEN TRANSCENDING ORAL HISTORY RESEARCH PROJECT
Rather than being defined and characterized by the state, and by the scholarship of those not directly impacted, formerly incarcerated women decided to tell their own stories through the The Women Transcending Oral History Research Project (OHRP). OHRP aims to document and raise up the leadership and organizing efforts of incarcerated, formerly incarcerated, and directly impacted women in the context of mass incarceration.
The Women Transcending Oral History Research Project lifts up the work that women -- particularly women of color -- who have been locked up and locked out of politics and civil society, do and have done to forge supportive networks undergirding positive change. Now more than ever we hold up the power of love and care to grow a movement.
Degrees of Freedom is one of the projects to come out of OHRP. In line with the goal of the OHRP for women to tell their own stories, the core group of formerly-incarcerated women also serve as Co-directors and Producers on the film.
Degrees of Freedom documents not only the organizing efforts of the women to bring back the college program but also the bonds that were formed among the women while incarcerated that continue today. From a small group at Bedford thirty years ago, this community of care has grown, extending behind and beyond the bars both nationally and internationally.
