Bidhan Chandra Roy, Ph.D.

Founder of Words Uncaged

Faculty Director of California State University, Los Angeles B.A. program, Dr. Roy is founder of the first in-prison degree program at Los Angeles County Prison that has now expanded to Lancaster State Prison, Mule Creek State Prison, and CMC Prison.

Born in England, Dr. Roy received his Ph.D. from Goldsmiths College, University of London. Trained in postcolonial studies and the twentieth-century British novel, he has published articles and book chapters on Hanif Kureishi, Muslim identity and the novel, literary representations of South Asian ethnicity, Buddhism and literature, Christopher Isherwood’s A Single Man, as well as the travel writing of V.S. Naipaul. His recently published monograph is titled, A Passage To Globalism: Globalization and the Negotiation of Identities in South Asian Diasporic Fiction in Britain.

In addition to his faculty role at California State University, Los Angeles, Dr. Roy is also the faculty director of CSULA's BA program at Lancaster State Prison and the Words Uncaged and Paws For Life programs at Lancaster State Prison, Mule Creek State Prison, and CMC Prison. These programs provide platforms for men sentenced to life sentences in California prisons to dialogue and critically engage with the world beyond the prison walls. The project offers opportunities for rethinking who incarcerated men are, exploring our common humanity, as well as imagining alternatives to the current prison industrial complex in the United States. There are a number of components of these projects, all of which offer opportunities for CSULA student involvement. These include; The Words Uncaged literary journal, the Words Uncaged Working Group (WWG) in Prison Pedagogy & Cultural Representation, the Words Uncaged Prison Art and Storying exhibitions, the Words Uncaged website, the prison writing library archive, and social media presence. (Source: California State University, Los Angeles)

State of Mind

Artwork created by Sadiqu Saibu
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