CHSS Distinguished Alumni - African and African American Studies

Jae-lynn Tavarez Brown is a passionate prison abolitionist and anthropologist at heart and in training. Her previous master's research in anthropology at George Mason University used ethnographic methods to understand how people interpret media messages about the prison system in their lived experiences. She found that connections within communities and social media are particularly strong sources of anti-hegemonic carceral narratives. She also studied restorative justice models as an alternative to punitive systems while working on a certificate program within George Mason’s Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution.  

Tavarez Brown currently lives in Baltimore, Maryland, where she works as a writing coordinator for the American Prison Writing Archive at Johns Hopkins University. She also spends her time engaging in union organizing and working with Baltimore Jail Support, a collective providing direct services to people being released from Baltimore Central Booking. 

Recognizing herself as a lifelong student means that her abolitionist praxis is continuously developing as she digests the wealth of knowledge from her mentors at George Mason and Johns Hopkins; her peers who are leading anti-racist, decolonial, and anti-carceral movements; and the communities within Baltimore and the D.C., Maryland, and Virginia region that have cultivated her. Within her current work, Tavarez Brown has been thinking about ethical archival practices and the possibilities of prison journalism.