The United Nations Mandela Rules state that solitary confinement is the “confinement of prisoners for 22 hours or more a day without meaningful human contact” (Rule 44). The anchoring theme in Cells of Wind is highly relevant to the Canadian context, where practices resembling “solitary confinement”, now known as “Structured Intervention Units” (SIUs), remains a pressing human rights issue. According to a recent report by Professors Jane Sprott and Anthony Doob (2021), two 2019 court rulings deemed that the use of administrative segregation violated the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Canada has since changed its methods just enough with the passing of Bill C-83, so that they no longer violate the Charter. Bill C-83 mandates that prisoners placed into SIUs must be out of their cells for four hours, with two of those hours involving “meaningful human contact.” However, recent reports indicate that prisoners are still not getting their allotted time out of their cells, along with other human rights concerns (Sprott and Doob, 2021). 

Policies akin to solitary confinement continue to be a social justice issue of vital importance in Canada that merits increased public awareness. With so much focus on inequities in the American criminal justice system, FAWN plans to use Cells of Wind as a platform to inform audiences of the impacts of solitary confinement in Canada, including the long-standing struggle over its use. We will do so through the staged production itself, as well as outreach programming on topics of Canadian exceptionalism and solitary confinement in Canada.

This opera will be a timely contribution to the ongoing national dialogue on criminal justice issues.