Jennifer E. Cobbina, Hands Up, Don't Shoot

Authors

Joshua R. Ruffin, Old Dominion University

Abstract

"Issues surrounding police use of excessive force continue to be a longstanding debate in the field of Criminal Justice. In the timely boots-on-the-ground work, Hands Up, Don't Shoot, Jennifer Cobbina amplifies the voices of Ferguson and Baltimore protestors by conducting indepth interviews with residents as it relates to their everyday experience with the police. In Hands Up, Don’t Shoot, Cobbina takes an “and” instead of an “or” approach in understanding the experiences often faced by residents of different intersecting identities in these communities. Further, Cobbina provides readers the opportunity to learn of the racialized experiences of these groups of protesters by including open-ended responses, which gives a detailed view of protest efforts and illustrations that aid the reader in imagining the events that had taken place during protest efforts in Ferguson and Baltimore. In the introduction, Cobbina recaps the events that led to the shooting of eighteen-year-old Michel brown. Most notably, Cobbina reminds readers that after twelve shots fired, Brown was hit six times, with two shots to the head. This disturbing, but relevant description sets the tone for the remainder of the book as it pertains to the unique experiences often faced at the intersection of race, place, and policing. Throughout the text, Cobbina reminds readers of the racialized history of the United States and critiques how the U.S. has become the ""U.S. of Amnesia"" in its seeming efforts to undermine the role the racialized police history of the United States plays in current-day policing. The following sections discuss each chapter and show how the historical processes addressed by Cobbina in Hands Up, Don’t Shoot, are linked to the contemporary race-based police practices, which often result in severe consequences, including legal cynicism and, most importantly, the loss of life."

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Recommended Citation

Ruffin, Joshua R. (2020) "Jennifer E. Cobbina, Hands Up, Don't Shoot," Qualitative Criminology (QC): Vol. 8: No. 3, Article 2.
Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/qc/vol8/iss3/2