Punished: Policing the Lives of Black and Latino Boys

Punished: Policing the Lives of Black and Latino Boys. By Victor M. Rios. New York: New York University Press, 2011. 218 pp. $20.00 paper.

Punitive strategies such as "tough on crime" and "zero tolerance" policies that have traditionally been restricted to the field of criminal justice are currently being implemented in mainstream institutions that serve youthful populations, such as schools and civic centers. While examinations of punitive discourses and practices, poverty, and youth crime are widely documented within the current sociological, criminological, and legal literature, studies often fail to take into account the lived experiences of the youth themselves. Through life history interviews and observations, Victor Rios's book, Punished: Policing the Lives of Black and Latino Boys, provides a voice for marginalized young men in Oakland and elucidates the processes through which these young men are shrouded in a culture of punishment that shapes their life experiences and trajectories. Moreover, Rios's work is a timely contribution given the current social and political debates regarding punitive policies.

Rios's study demonstrates how criminalization, as a systemic form of punitive social control, is a dominant and omnipresent phenomenon in the lives of young males in Oakland that systematically governs and limits their...