雷金纳德-德韦恩-贝茨 诗人和律师

shiyi18

Reginald Dwayne Betts
Poet and Lawyer | Class of 2021
Promoting the humanity and rights of individuals who are or have been incarcerated.


Portrait of Reginald Dwayne Betts

Title
Poet and Lawyer
Affiliation
Yale Law School
Location
New Haven, Connecticut
Age
40 at time of award
Area of Focus
Poetry, Criminal Justice
Website
dwaynebetts.com
Freedom Reads
Social
Twitter
Twitter: Freedom Reads
Published September 28, 2021
ABOUT DWAYNE'S WORK
Reginald Dwayne Betts is a poet and lawyer promoting the rights and humanity of people who are or have been incarcerated. Betts’s work is informed by his experience with incarceration after being tried as an adult for a carjacking at the age of sixteen. As a practicing lawyer, Betts fights for clemency and parole for individuals facing lengthy sentences, and he is a member of local and national taskforces dedicated to ending cash bail, limiting sentence lengths, and prohibiting the practice of sending juveniles to adult prisons.

His poetry reflects both his legal training—particularly his deep engagement with scholarship on notions of guilt, punishment, and justice—and his command of craft. Throughout Felon (2019), his third collection, Betts inhabits multiple voices, making visible the entire spectrum of the criminal justice system. The opening poem, titled “Ghazal,” is written in the classical Arabic form of the same name, which is characterized by rhyming couplets that end with a repeated refrain. In this case, the refrain is “after prison,” and the speaker recounts the separation and loss that come with imprisonment and the struggle to rebuild a life as a convicted felon. “For a Bail Denied” depicts the fear and despair of a teenager, his mother, and his public defender in a hearing that results in his imprisonment. In a series of redaction poems, Betts uses source material from Civil Rights Corps lawsuits that challenge the imposition of cash bail and court fees. He blacks out the often obscure and sanitizing language of legal documents to lay bare the criminalization of poverty. Impoverished people, unable to pay traffic tickets or excessive bail, are jailed indefinitely in a modern-day version of debtor’s prison. In collaboration with artist Titus Kaphar, Betts created a series of prints of the redacted poems overlaying Kaphar’s portraits of the plaintiffs in the lawsuits. The resulting exhibition, Redaction (2019), was a powerful indictment of the human impact of cash bail. It addressed a community that rarely sees itself reflected back from the walls of museums.

Betts recently launched the nonprofit Freedom Reads to give incarcerated people access to the power of literature. Freedom Reads donates books and shelving for libraries, organizes author visits, and sets up book circles in prisons and juvenile detention facilities. Through his profoundly moving poems, public defense work, and advocacy efforts, Betts provides a unique perspective on the lifelong impacts of incarceration and the injustice of a criminal justice system that relies so heavily upon it.

BIOGRAPHY
Reginald Dwayne Betts received a BA (2009) from the University of Maryland, an MFA (2010) from Warren Wilson College, and a JD (2016) from Yale Law School. He is currently a PhD candidate in law at Yale Law School. Betts was appointed by President Barack Obama to the Coordinating Council of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention in 2012, and since 2018 he has served as a member of Connecticut’s Criminal Justice Commission, which appoints state prosecutors. His additional publications include the poetry collections Bastards of the Reagan Era (2015) and Shahid Reads His Own Palm (2010) and the memoir Question of Freedom: A Memoir of Learning, Survival, and Coming of Age in Prison (2009).

IN DWAYNE'S WORDS
Middle aged Black man with beard and black frame glasses wearing a sweater with green trees in background. Quote text below photo reads: Freedom begins with a book. I believe building Freedom Libraries, and placing them in prisons across this country, will be the start of somebody’s story of freedom.


A single book, Dudley Randall’s The Black Poets, slid under my cell in the hole, introduced me to the poets that had me believing words can be carved into a kind of freedom. And years later, I’ve been able to use some of those words to get people I did time with out of prison. And so I do believe that freedom begins with a book. I believe building Freedom Libraries, and placing them in prisons across this country, will be the start of somebody’s story of freedom.



雷金纳德-德韦恩-贝茨
诗人和律师 | 2021级
促进正在或已经被监禁的个人的人性和权利。


雷金纳德-德韦恩-贝茨的画像

标题
诗人和律师
工作单位
耶鲁大学法学院
工作地点
纽黑文，康涅狄格州
年龄
获奖时40岁
关注领域
诗歌、刑事司法
网站
dwaynebetts.com
自由阅读
社会
推特
推特。自由阅读
出版日期：2021年9月28日
关于德韦恩的工作
雷金纳德-德韦恩-贝茨（Reginald Dwayne Betts）是一位诗人和律师，致力于促进正在或已经被监禁的人的权利和人性。贝茨的作品源于他在16岁时因劫车被作为成年人审判后的监禁经历。作为一名执业律师，贝茨为面临漫长刑期的个人争取宽恕和假释，他是地方和国家工作队的成员，致力于结束现金保释，限制刑期，并禁止将青少年送往成人监狱的做法。

他的诗歌既反映了他的法律训练--特别是他对关于有罪、惩罚和正义概念的学术研究的深入参与--也反映了他对工艺的掌握。在他的第三本诗集《重刑犯》（2019年）中，贝茨采用了多种声音，使刑事司法系统的整个范围变得明显。开篇题为 "Ghazal"，是以同名的古典阿拉伯语形式写的，其特点是以重复的反语结束的押韵对句。在这种情况下，反问句是 "入狱后"，说话者讲述了入狱后的分离和损失，以及作为一个被定罪的重罪犯重建生活的挣扎。"为被拒绝的保释 "描述了一个少年、他的母亲和他的公设辩护人在导致他入狱的听证会上的恐惧和绝望。在一系列的编辑诗中，贝茨使用了民权团诉讼的原始材料，这些诉讼挑战了现金保释和法庭费用的实施。他把法律文件中通常晦涩难懂和消毒的语言涂黑，把贫穷的犯罪化暴露无遗。贫穷的人无力支付交通罚单或过高的保释金，被无限期地关押在现代版的债务人监狱。在与艺术家Titus Kaphar的合作中，贝茨创作了一系列经编辑的诗歌的印刷品，并将Kaphar对诉讼中原告的肖像叠加起来。由此产生的展览 "重新行动"（2019年），是对现金保释对人类影响的有力控诉。它针对的是一个很少从博物馆的墙壁上看到自己的反思的社区。

贝茨最近发起了非营利性的 "自由阅读"，让被监禁的人获得文学的力量。自由阅读 "为图书馆捐赠书籍和书架，组织作家访问，并在监狱和青少年拘留所建立图书圈。通过他深刻感人的诗歌、公共辩护工作和宣传工作，贝茨对监禁的终身影响和严重依赖监禁的刑事司法系统的不公正性提供了一个独特的视角。

个人简历
雷金纳德-德韦恩-贝茨在马里兰大学获得学士学位（2009年），在沃伦-威尔逊学院获得艺术硕士学位（2010年），并在耶鲁大学法学院获得法学博士学位（2016年）。他目前是耶鲁大学法学院的法学博士候选人。贝茨在2012年被巴拉克-奥巴马总统任命为少年司法和犯罪预防办公室协调委员会成员，自2018年以来，他一直担任康涅狄格州刑事司法委员会的成员，该委员会负责任命州检察官。他的其他出版物包括诗集《里根时代的混蛋》（2015年）和《沙希德读自己的手掌》（2010年）以及回忆录《自由的问题》。回忆录《自由的问题：关于学习、生存和在监狱中长大的回忆录》（2009）。

用德维恩的话说
留着胡子、戴着黑框眼镜的中年黑人男子穿着毛衣，背景是绿树。照片下面的引言文字是：。自由从一本书开始。我相信建立自由图书馆，并把它们放在这个国家的监狱里，将是某人自由故事的开始。


一本书，杜德利-兰德尔的《黑人诗人》，滑落在我的牢房洞下，让我认识了那些诗人，让我相信文字可以被雕刻成一种自由。多年以后，我已经能够使用其中的一些文字，让和我一起坐牢的人出狱。因此，我确实相信，自由从一本书开始。我相信建立自由图书馆，并把它们放在这个国家的监狱里，将是某人自由故事的开始。