Nicole Janine van Zyl

NICOLE VAN ZYL, then a graduate student at University of the Western Cape, Belleville, South Africa, received funding in April 2021 to aid research on “Exit Wounds: Colonial Legacies of Subject Formation in Present-day Parole in South Africa,” supervised by Dr. Kelly Gillespie. This research report details the fieldwork undertaken in the Pollsmoor and East London Correctional Services Management Areas. The project was designed to investigate the operation of the system of parole in South Africa, and place the operations of the state into conversation with the history of the practice of early release from incarceration and its relationship to the British colonization of the eastern and western capes of South Africa. This analysis is part of a larger academic movement examining the conditions that allow for neocolonial conditions to persist. The researcher conducted observations of Community Supervision and Parole Board (CSPB) hearings for a period of three months in the two locations. The observations of the board hearings were later supplemented by additional research on the activities and functions of community corrections as they fulfilled the requirements of supervision for paroled people in both management areas.