Reentry Awareness Month in Philadelphia
As I’m sure I’ve made pretty obvious, the topic of returning citizens has been and continues to be a passion of mine. It’s a group of traumatized individuals that are just now beginning to receive nationwide attention, but continues to be a controversial topic. I plan on writing my final paper on the topic on this very subject. They are a group that is complex in not only its needs from the community, but are not complete victims in their struggle, as other trauma survivors are such as survivors of sexual assault. I believe that because of their history of offenses, it creates a difficulty from our community to humanize them and their traumatic experiences in places that some would argue “they deserved to be in.”
This, along with the amount of trauma experienced in prison is astounding. The moment one enters prison, several assessments of both mental health and criminal history are made along with strip and cavity searches. While in prison, violent assault, including sexual assault committed by both inmates and officers, dehumanization of inmates and utter loss of free choice is the reality of inmates. Institutionalization is the more specialized term used for inmates becoming accustomed to prison and in many ways becoming accustomed to the trauma that prison entails.
During my research for my final paper, however, I found an interesting article of a reentry month that is celebrated in Philadelphia. This Reentry Awareness Month is celebrated in June and is a new resolution for the city. The article that showcases Philadelphia’s resolution also attaches an article for trauma-informed events around the city. These events are geared not only towards the 25,000 returning citizens in the city, but to loved ones and community members that would benefit in learning about returning citizens and their plight in returning to the community and dealing with their trauma. If you wish you read more about this, here’s the link: https://generocity.org/philly/2018/05/29/reentry-awareness-month-18-events-coalition/