LIFE%20IN%20PRISON

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LIFE IN PRISON

• Female Inmates Adaptation and/or Subscription to
  Inmate Code (prisionization)

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• PRISIONIZATION the taking on, in greater or
  lesser degree, of the folkways, mores, customs
  and general culture of the penitentiary.
  Donald Clemmer

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The Invisible Criminal

• Historical implications
• Gender was secondary
• Imprisonment followed male guidelines
• Different type of care than male convicts
• Imprisoned and then forgotten
• No programs
• No medical attention
• No supervision
• Few opportunities to work
• Today there is more parity in policy but is there
  equality?

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PRISON CULTURE

• Subjugation
• Institutionally paternalistic
• Systematically repressive/arbitrary
• Symbolizes oppressive authority
• Intensifies powerlessness
• Strips away identity
• Dysfunctional environment

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PAINS OF IMPRISONMENT

• Separation from family
• Freedom of choice and activity limited
• Apprehension
• Stigma
• Lack of experience
• Ward Kassebaum, 1964

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FOUR RESPONSES TO PAINS OF IMPRISIONMENT

• DEATH
• INSTITUTIONALIZATION
• SELF-MUTILATION
• MADNESS

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INSTITUTION EFFECTS

• Below quality of mens prisons
• Provide fewer programs/reinforce traditional
  roles
• Less access to lawyers outside contacts
• Unspecialized prison
• More severe impact
• Experience two emotions
• Surprise
• Fear
• Look to staff
• Information
• Material goods

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INSTITUTION EFFECTS (cont)

• Inmate Code
• Not as salient for females as for male prisoners
• Reaction to deprivation
• Identity as women
• Internalization of delinquent subcultures
• Importation vs. deprivation direct effect on
  subscription to code
• Importation criminal history and personal
  characteristics
• Deprivation situational or prison-specific
  variables
• Low subscription
• End of term ???
• 1st arrest after age 25
• High subscription
• Middle of sentence ???
• Younger and urban inmates
• Prior imprisonments
• More serious convictions (verbally)
• Married
• Short-timers/early phase

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INSTITUTION EFFECTS (cont)

• Also
• Low subscription indicated by little role playing
• Merchants
• Politicians
• Gorilla
• Reflects male needs for status, independence, and
  masculine self-image
• Less predatory inmate population
• More like medium security mens prison
• Less tense
• Less violent
• Subculture Men vs Women
• Mens exist to protect from each other
• Neutralize rejection
• Emotional support

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Gender

• Women experience incarceration differently
• Likely to be rule-breakers
• Gender-based frameworks
• Less social capital
• Subverts mother-child bond
• Do not maintain group solidarity
• Informing on others characteristic
• Not relevant for women
• Roles differentiated along sexual lines
• Emotional/ manipulative coping strategies
• Dramatically different from mens
• Perpetuate gender stereotypes inside
• Engage in self-aggression
• Suicide
• Self-mutilation
• Seen as less respectful to authority
• Willing to argue
• Written up twice as much as men
• For less serious infraction

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OTHER OBSERVATIONS

• Jenson and Jones
• Examines prisonization during 1970s
• Studies career phase
• No issue of overcrowing addressed
• Did not consider other impact of public
  institutions
• Social services experiences
• Foster care
• Welfare recipients
• Continue to use male oriented questions
• Womens needs not considered

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• McCorkels article suggests
• View of women prisoners have changed
• Redefining of dependency
• Marriage of welfare and criminal justice
  policies- maybe more to come
• Reform efforts replaced with punishment
• Different internal and external pressure for
  change
• Solution to overcrowding
• Replace penal paternalism
• Made prisonlike
• Treat women like men masculine
• More punitive

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CONCLUSION

• Inmates tend to undergo some degree of
• prisonization irrespective of race, education,
• urban-nonurban status, prior prison experience,
• legal status and offense. (Jensen Jones, 1976)
• However, the deceptive nature of womens
• prisons while subtle, is stronger than in
• mens institutions. (Chapter 1, p.20)