Includes bibliographical references (pages 147-152) and index.

Education : life or death
A tough sell: education and incarceration
The geography of incarceration: the glass bubble in the big house
Of Freire and Frost: reading the world behind bars
"No hugs for thugs": surveillance and control
"I will write myself out of prison": rewriting the self
Writing in the dark: profiles of incarcerated learners
"What if I had started to write in high school?": interrupting the school-to-prison pipeline
"Songs from the genius child": words no bars can hold
Thoughts byeond the bars: the dark and the light

"Words No Bars Can Hold provides a rare glimpse into literacy learning under the most dehumanizing conditions. Deborah Appleman chronicles her work teaching college- level classes at a high- security prison for men, most of whom are serving life sentences. Through narrative, poetry, memoir, and fiction, the students in Appleman's classes attempt to write themselves back into a society that has erased their lived histories.The students' work, through which they probe and develop their identities as readers and writers, illuminates the transformative power of literacy. Appleman argues for the importance of educating the incarcerated, and explores ways to interrupt the increasingly common journey from urban schools to our nation's prisons."