The Critical Theory and Practice of the Credible Messenger Movement: Why Solidarity, Love and Consciousness Matter.

Session Submission Type: Complete Thematic Panel

Abstract/Description

The growth of credible messengers as part of the movement for community-based responses to crime and violence has been meteoric in the last two decades and represents a welcome shift away from punitive designs of social control. Nonetheless, both the theory and practice of such interventions are widely interpreted spanning both neo-liberal and critical criminological discourses. In this panel presenters draw on their research experiences to radically conceptualize the work of these important interventionists who help mitigate the impacts of structural violence in oppressed communities by aiding subjects in both their individual and collective pathways toward transcendence, healing and generative forms of justice.

Sub Unit

• Area X. Critical Criminology / 76. Critical Perspectives in Criminology

Individual Presentations

• A Critical Interpretation of the Credible Messenger - David Brotherton, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY

• Mental health, social disorder, and Transformative Mentoring of Youth - Danny Kessler, John Jay College of Criminal Justice

• The Fallacies of Zero-Sum, Credible Messengers and the Beloved Community - Louis Kontos, John Jay College of Criminal Justice

• Credible Messengers, Transformation and the Community - Rod Martinez, Howard University

Chair

• David Brotherton, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY

Organized by a Division or external group?

critical criminology