Prison newspapers made by and for prisoners have battled censorship and bans. But they've proven that, more than 70 years later, they're not going anywhere.
"I went in with a very good attitude and I was like, I'm going to get therapy and work on myself, and I want to go back to university," he tellsLinnane says during his two-year sentence in the New South Wales corrections system he couldn't access a mental health care plan or ongoing counselling, and there was insufficient resourcing to enable his university study.That's when Linnane started thinking about prison newspapers .
Back in 2015 Linnane had no access to such a publication, but when he started researching the topic, he learnt that a precedent for prison journalism had existed in Australia for decades."Between 1788 and the First World War, the prison system didn't change very much, and prisoners were completely isolated. There weren't any visits, and they weren't allowed to have mainstream newspapers, either," Linnane says.
Early papers like this 1978 issue of Jail News, from Grafton jail, relied on materials donated to the prison, sometimes by local schools.Then, in the 1950s, prison journalism — publications produced by prisoners themselves — kicked off.Some prisons gave prisoners the freedom to air grievances, and others, like the Stockade newspaper at Melbourne's Pentridge Prison, were unpopular because of its heavy censoring.
"Both of those publications … actually had really big external subscription lists. Many politicians, judges, universities would all get the latest issue of Contact or In Limbo," Linnane says. Early publications were often made with donated materials, on a duplicator , and pages wet with ink would be hung out to dry on prison clothes lines.
Damien Linnane Prison Papers Prison Newspapers Jail Magazine Paper Chained About Time Prisoner Journalism Pentridge Prison Incarceration
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