Criminal law and justice system practices as racist, white, and racialized

Abstract

For close to a decade I have been engaged in research on the ways that gender and race structure the sentencing process in the New Haven felony court.' In the early phase of the research, I was particularly interested in how gender structured the court's response to those accused. In time, that question evolved to one that asked how the court's response to accused men and women, most of whom lived at society's margins, varied by race and ethnicity. Today it is difficult for me to think about race without also having in mind black, white, and latino masculinities. It is also difficult to write a sentence about race differences without recalling gender differences within racial and ethnic groups. As we discuss race and class in the criminal justice system, let us not forget that both have a gendered face