IncorrigibleWilfrid Laurier Univ. Press, 2006 M01 1 - 172 páginas On a May morning in 1939, eighteen-year-old Velma Demerson and her lover were having breakfast when two police officers arrived to take her away. Her crime was loving a Chinese man, a “crime” that was compounded by her pregnancy and subsequent mixed-race child. Sentenced to a home for wayward girls, Demerson was then transferred (along with forty-six other girls) to Torontos Mercer Reformatory for Females. The girls were locked in their cells for twelve hours a day and required to work in the on-site laundry and factory. They also endured suspect medical examinations. When Demerson was finally released after ten months’ incarceration weeks of solitary confinement, abusive medical treatments, and the state’s apprehension of her child, her marriage to her lover resulted in the loss of her citizenship status. This is the story of how Demerson, and so many other girls, were treated as criminals or mentally defective individuals, even though their worst crime might have been only their choice of lover. Incorrigible is a survivor’s narrative. In a period that saw the rise of psychiatry, legislation against interracial marriage, and a populist movement that believed in eradicating disease and sin by improving the purity of Anglo-Saxon stock, Velma Demerson, like many young women, found herself confronted by powerful social forces. This is a history of some of those who fell through the cracks of the criminal code, told in a powerful first-person voice. |
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... windows embedded in the dark stone exterior frighten me. The building is distant from the street but as we draw near I can see the women who were at the Belmont Home with me leave the other car and move toward, then up the stairs. They ...
... window, a woman with greying hair and wearing a brown dress with a broach opens the door. Her appearance suggests she's the superintendent and is expecting us. Her attention is directed towards the men who have escorted us and with whom ...
... windows. The windows are too high to see out but are nevertheless barred. There's a large unreachable box that looks like a loudspeaker fastened to the wall above a cell. No sound ever comes out of it. The floors are hardwood, darkened ...
... window at the rear of the building. She's wearing rubber gloves. I place myself near the front of the line next to my best friend Sue who's in a very late stage of pregnancy. The doctor gets up from her seat and says, “Now I want to ...
... lady. She sits at a long table behind us, her back to the windows that afford all the light. She's very strict and we must maintain full attention to our task. There's definitely no talking, though we can Chapter Two 11.
Contenido
CHAPTER 12 | 111 |
CHAPTER 13 | 121 |
CHAPTER 14 | 127 |
CHAPTER 15 | 135 |
CHAPTER 16 | 141 |
CHAPTER 17 | 149 |
CHAPTER 18 | 159 |
AFTERWORD | 165 |