Source: Prof Victoria Robinson, UC Berkeley
Tags: social death, neoslavery, 13th amendment, convict lease system, necropolitics, Native Americans, boarding schools, Dawes Act, Chinese Exclusion Act, Japanese internment, nativism, Black Panther Party, COINTELPRO, survival pending revolution
Weeks 5 through 8 trace the carceral logic from slavery through neoslavery to modern mass incarceration, then apply it to Native American dispossession, immigrant exclusion, and Black resistance movements. The through-line is how the state uses legal mechanisms (the 13th Amendment exemption, the Major Crimes Act, exclusion acts, COINTELPRO) to control racialised populations, and how communities organise in response.
Social death / natal alienation
The condition of being stripped of social ties, identity, and belonging. Applied to enslaved people, prisoners, and Native Americans removed from families. Natal alienation specifically refers to forced separation from kin and community. Source: "Prison and Social Death."
Neoslavery / 13th Amendment exemption / Black codes
The 13th Amendment abolished slavery "except as punishment for crime." This exemption allowed chattelised slavery to evolve into neoslavery through the modern prison system and forced labour. Black codes were laws designed to restrict the freedoms of formerly enslaved people and funnel them into the criminal justice system. Source: "Slaves of the State."
Historical / national amnesia
The practice of forgetting or inaccurately reporting racist history. The course cites the "all lives matter" response to #BLM as an example, and references Hillary Clinton's invocation of the Dunning School (a school of historiography that sympathised with the Confederacy and minimised the violence of slavery).
Convict lease system
The practice of leasing convicted people to private employers, who worked them often to death under harsh conditions for profit. A direct continuation of the economic logic of slavery. Source: "Are Prisons Obsolete?"
Fugitive Slave Act of 1850
Federal law requiring the capture and return of escaped enslaved people to their owners. Extended the reach of slavery into free states.
Necropolitics
The politics of death: how states contribute to the destruction of people through policy, neglect, or active violence. Covers Weeks 4 and 5 thematically.
Performance in social justice struggles
Five elements: place, content, audience, time, goal. A framework for analysing how acts of resistance are staged and understood.
Presence of absence
When the state does not intervene, the question becomes: who is erased, who is silenced, who is placed in a space that renders them invisible? Rooted in Derrida. Connected to the placement of the PIC in California's Central Valley (Gilmore) and the active absence of the state from marginalised communities.
Radical Reconstruction (1867–1877)
The period after the Civil War when the federal government attempted to rebuild the South and protect the rights of formerly enslaved people. Ultimately undermined by the withdrawal of federal troops and the rise of Jim Crow.
Second Reconstruction
The Civil Rights movement, framed as a continuation of the unfinished work of Radical Reconstruction.
Sovereignty / self-determination
The right of Native peoples to govern themselves. The course frames the erosion of sovereignty as cultural genocide.
Boarding schools
Assimilation policy summarised as "Kill the Indian to Save the Man." Children were forcibly removed from families and communities to be stripped of language, culture, and identity. Source: Andrea Smith, "Soul Wound."
Dawes Act
Forced Native Americans to accept US citizenship and individual land allotments, resulting in the loss of two-thirds of Indian land. Broke up communal land ownership as a tool of assimilation.
Treadmill of destruction / treadmill of production
The cycle linking military production, environmental destruction, and Native genocide. Connected to the military industrial complex. Source: Smith and Hooks (Week 6).
Xenophobia / nativism
Fear and hostility toward foreign-born people. The legal and cultural framework that justifies exclusion.
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882
The first major federal law restricting immigration by race. Before the Act, Chinese women were already barred because of the link between prostitution and Chinese women in the public imagination. Source: George Anthony Peffer.
Page Act of 1875
Preceded the Chinese Exclusion Act. Targeted Chinese women specifically, barring those suspected of entering the US for "immoral purposes."
E.O. 9066 / Japanese internment / probational citizenship
Executive Order 9066 authorised the internment of Japanese Americans. The concept of "probational citizenship" describes how certain groups hold citizenship only conditionally, subject to revocation in times of crisis. Compared to Germany's concentration camps. Source: Ch. 5, "The WWII Internment of..."
Virtual internment
Hatem Bazian's term for the post-9/11 treatment of Muslims and Arabs: quasi-visible but repressive, intimidating, and confining government structures that do not require physical detention.
AZ SB 1070
Arizona's "show me your papers" law, which targeted people who "look illegal." The course notes that immigration falls under federal jurisdiction, making the state law an overreach that racially profiled Latino communities.
1790 Naturalization Law
Restricted citizenship to "free white persons" who could self-determine. This restriction was not fully removed until 1970, when African Americans gained the right to naturalise.
Prerequisite naturalization cases
51 cases that tested who counted as "white" for citizenship purposes.
Ah Yup (1878): ruled Japanese Americans were not white
Po vs. City Court of NY (1894): introduced racial triangulation, with white as the citizenship category and Black and yellow as excluded (citizenship value and social value differ)
Ozawa v. US (1914–1920): Ozawa argued his skin was as white as a Caucasian's and that race should not matter. Application denied.
Thind v. US: Indians classified as not white
Racial triangulation
The framework from the prerequisite cases showing that white occupies the citizenship category, while Black and Asian/yellow are positioned differently in relation to both citizenship value and social value.
1924 National Origins Act
Created immigration quotas based on national origin, designed to restrict non-Western European immigration.
1965 Hart-Cellar Immigration and Naturalization Act
Removed race-based immigration restrictions. Created categories of family, refugee, and employment-based immigration. Motivated partly by Cold War pressure to appear welcoming as a global leader. Caused mass diversification of the US population.
Alien indigestion (Mae Ngai)
A metaphor for the anxiety around immigration, framing immigrants as something the nation cannot "digest."
COINTELPRO
FBI programme created in the 1960s to target groups organising during the Civil Rights movement. Used surveillance, infiltration, and disruption against the Black Panther Party and other organisations. Source: Hatem Bazian.
Survival pending revolution
The Black Panther Party's strategy of providing community programmes (breakfast programmes, free health clinics, learning centres, housing) during political upheaval and anti-Black sentiment. Created out of necessity to empower and educate communities while working toward revolutionary change.
Black Panther Party for Self-Defense
Founded on the principle of armed self-defence against police violence. The Ten-Point Platform outlined demands for freedom, employment, housing, education, and an end to police brutality.
Revolutionary intercommunalism
Huey Newton's framework for understanding that globalisation has made independent nation-states obsolete. The principal contradiction is between the capitalist imperialist ruling class consolidating global hegemony and the anarchy unleashed by doing so. Informed by Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and the practice of the BPP.
Dissent vs. crime
The distinction between political organising (dissent) and criminal activity. The state collapses this distinction through crime control vs. community control frameworks.
Social death and natal alienation as the condition of prisoners, studied through their actual living conditions
Neoslavery: the 13th Amendment's "except as punishment for crime" clause allowed chattelised slavery to evolve into forced prison labour. Black codes were the legal mechanism.
Historical amnesia: the failure to accurately report racist history. The "all lives matter" framing erases the specific conditions that produced #BLM.
State-sanctioned slavery: the lynching of Emmett Louis Till illustrates how the state permitted racial violence
Convict lease system: convicts leased to private employers, worked to death for profit. A direct economic continuation of slavery.
Fugitive Slave Act of 1850: extended slavery's reach by requiring capture and return of escaped people
Necropolitics: the state contributes to the destruction of people through policy and neglect
Presence of absence: who the state renders invisible by not intervening. Connected to Derrida and to Gilmore's work on prison placement.
Radical Reconstruction (1867–1877) and the Second Reconstruction (Civil Rights movement) as two attempts to fulfil the promise of abolition democracy
Sovereignty and self-determination are framed as targets of cultural genocide through the reservation system
Natal alienation: forcible removal from families, replicated through boarding schools
Boarding schools: the explicit policy of "Kill the Indian to Save the Man." Cultural erasure through forced assimilation. Source: Andrea Smith, "Soul Wound."
Dawes Act: forced citizenship and land allotment, resulting in loss of two-thirds of Indian land. Broke communal ownership to weaken tribal structures.
Treadmill of destruction: links military production, environmental destruction, and Native genocide through the military industrial complex
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882: first race-based federal immigration restriction. The Page Act of 1875 had already targeted Chinese women.
E.O. 9066 and Japanese internment: probational citizenship revoked in crisis. Compared to concentration camps.
Post-9/11 Islamophobia: Moustafa Bayoumi's "How Does It Feel to Be a Problem?" captures the experience. Bazian's "virtual internment" describes the repressive structures.
AZ SB 1070: racial profiling through a "show me your papers" law, despite immigration being federal jurisdiction
Prerequisite naturalisation cases: 51 cases over decades to determine who counted as white. Key cases: Ah Yup, Po, Ozawa, Thind. Racial triangulation emerged from these rulings.
1790 to 1970: the arc from "free white persons only" to African American naturalisation rights
1924 National Origins Act created race-based quotas; 1965 Hart-Cellar Act removed them, driven by Cold War politics
Community organising: Source: "How I Became a Revolutionary" by Hebal
COINTELPRO: FBI's systematic targeting of Civil Rights-era organisations. Surveillance, infiltration, disruption.
Survival pending revolution: the Panthers' community programmes (breakfast, health clinics, learning centres, housing) were created out of necessity during anti-Black political conditions
Third World politics: connected to revolutionary intercommunalism and solidarity across racialised groups (Ferreira/Besenia)
Asian American mobilisation: the model minority myth treats Asian Americans as a group that does not experience racism, creating barriers to political organising. Source: "Pacific Islander Struggle for Social Justice."
Dissent vs. crime: the state frames political organising as criminal activity through the lens of crime control rather than community control
⚠️ The 13th Amendment exemption is the legal hinge connecting slavery to neoslavery. Be able to trace the line from chattel slavery through Black codes through the convict lease system to the modern PIC.
⚠️ Know the prerequisite naturalisation cases by name (Ah Yup, Ozawa, Thind) and be able to explain what racial triangulation means.
⚠️ The Dawes Act and boarding schools are both tools of cultural genocide. They work differently (land vs. identity) but toward the same end: dismantling Native sovereignty.
⚠️ Survival pending revolution is not charity. The exam framing positions the Panthers' programmes as revolutionary acts created out of necessity, not goodwill.
⚠️ The 1965 Hart-Cellar Act removed race-based restrictions but was motivated by Cold War optics, not moral transformation. Be ready to discuss this tension.
⚠️ COINTELPRO is the state's response to the dissent vs. crime question: it criminalised political organising.
Q: How does the 13th Amendment's exception clause connect slavery to modern mass incarceration?
A: The 13th Amendment abolished slavery "except as punishment for crime." This exemption allowed Black codes to criminalise everyday behaviour of formerly enslaved people, funnelling them into the convict lease system, where they were forced to work under conditions mirroring slavery. This legal pathway evolved into the modern prison system and mass incarceration.
Q: What is "virtual internment" and how does it differ from physical internment?
A: Hatem Bazian uses "virtual internment" to describe the post-9/11 treatment of Muslims and Arabs through quasi-visible but repressive government structures: mass surveillance, sealed procedures, intimidation, and confinement that does not require physical detention camps. Unlike Japanese American internment under E.O. 9066, virtual internment operates through bureaucratic and legal mechanisms rather than physical relocation.
Q: What was the purpose of Native American boarding schools, and how do they connect to natal alienation?
A: Boarding schools were designed to forcibly assimilate Native children under the policy "Kill the Indian to Save the Man." Children were removed from families and stripped of language, culture, and identity. This is a direct form of natal alienation: severing ties to kin and community as a tool of cultural genocide.
Q: What is racial triangulation, and which legal cases illustrate it?
A: Racial triangulation positions white as the citizenship category, with Black and Asian/yellow positioned differently in relation to both citizenship value and social value. The prerequisite naturalisation cases illustrate this: Ah Yup (1878) ruled Japanese Americans were not white; Ozawa (1914–1920) argued his skin was white but was denied; Thind was classified as not white despite being Indian. Po vs. City Court of NY (1894) made the triangulation structure explicit.
Q: Why does the course describe survival pending revolution as a revolutionary strategy rather than a social service?
A: The Black Panther Party created community programmes (breakfast, health clinics, learning centres, housing) not as charity but as a political response to anti-Black conditions. These programmes empowered and educated communities while building the infrastructure for revolutionary change, addressing immediate survival needs within a framework aimed at transforming the system.
social death, natal alienation, neoslavery, 13th amendment exemption, Black codes, convict lease system, Fugitive Slave Act, necropolitics, presence of absence, Derrida, Radical Reconstruction, Second Reconstruction, sovereignty, self-determination, boarding schools, Kill the Indian, Dawes Act, treadmill of destruction, military industrial complex, Chinese Exclusion Act, Page Act, E.O. 9066, Japanese internment, probational citizenship, virtual internment, Hatem Bazian, Islamophobia, Moustafa Bayoumi, AZ SB 1070, racial profiling, 1790 Naturalization Law, prerequisite cases, Ozawa, Thind, Ah Yup, racial triangulation, National Origins Act, Hart-Cellar Act, COINTELPRO, Black Panther Party, survival pending revolution, Ten-Point Platform, revolutionary intercommunalism, Huey Newton, model minority, dissent, community control