**BRIEF OVERVIEW** --Know the difference between race/ethnicity and the problems of defining/classifying discussed in the first few pages of the book --know key terms, such as disparity and discrimination defined in the margins of the chapter Some factoids: --**ROUGHLY** 39 percent of the US prison population Black, --**ROUGHLY** 32 percent of the US prison population Black, **Roughly** 23 percent Hispanic --Blacks were almost three times more likely than Hispanics and five times more likely than whites to be in JAIL. --Our text tells us that nearly ten percent of African American children have fathers in jail compared with about 3.5 percent white and hispanic The key question for social scientists: Why does their appear to be a disproportionate number of certain ethnical/racial groups in prison? Which is the key factor: Class or race? Key areas of potential discrimination as "independent variables": to explain racial disparity in prisons: --differential crime rates --Racism in the criminal justice system or in society --police bias/profiling --prosecution decisions --sentencing Be able to answer the question addressed at the end of the chapter and defend your position: What role does racism play in corrections?
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