“Age is Just a Number in Here”: A Qualitative Study of Adulthood in a Women’s Prison

Janani Umamaheswar

doi:10.21428/88de04a1.e720d7db

Abstract

Desistance from crime is a significant marker of adulthood, while persistence in criminal behavior is inconsistent with a subjective sense of adulthood (Massoglia & Uggen, 2010). To understand the relationship between crime and adulthood in greater detail, however, it is important to understand how offenders interpret and conceptualize the notion of adulthood in the first place. Based on interviews and mail correspondence with 35 incarcerated women, I explore this question through an examination of how incarcerated women construct definitions of adulthood while in prison. The findings indicate that in a restrictive environment marked by a lack of independence, women in prison rely on intangible markers to define adulthood. Moreover, the inmates believe that these markers are best manifested by those women who have been incarcerated for long periods (5 years or more). I discuss these findings by drawing on older prisonization literature and life-course literature on adulthood.

Highlights

AND LITERATURE REVIEWThe punitive turn of the penal system has arguably been one of the most significant institutional transformations in the United States over the last few decades
The specific goal of this study is to investigate how women prisoners construct definitions of adulthood while incarcerated, and whether they adhere to conventional markers of adulthood
47 years old, serving 9 months – 2 years for prostitution, emphasis in original interview. The women in this sample did express a great deal of conformity to conventional markers of adulthood, with motherhood being the most salient element of the women’s narratives

Summary

Introduction

AND LITERATURE REVIEWThe punitive turn of the penal system has arguably been one of the most significant institutional transformations in the United States over the last few decades. Kruttschnitt and Gartner (2003: 63) have argued that there is virtue in reinvigorating the classic qualitative prison sociology that focused on women prisoners’ lived experiences, by “broadening the range of questions that can be asked about the experiences, consequences, and justifications of imprisonment as punishment.”. To this end, the most general purpose of this study is to answer scholars’ calls for qualitative prison studies on how women respond to, cope with, and even demonstrate resistance to the prison environment The lack of research on women in prisons is especially surprising because women have been disproportionately affected by the U.S.’s increased emphasis on punishment and crime control: Between 1980 and 2008, for instance, the imprisonment rate for women increased more than six-fold (Kruttschnitt, 2010; MacKenzie, 2006). Kruttschnitt and Gartner (2003: 63) have argued that there is virtue in reinvigorating the classic qualitative prison sociology that focused on women prisoners’ lived experiences, by “broadening the range of questions that can be asked about the experiences, consequences, and justifications of imprisonment as punishment.” To this end, the most general purpose of this study is to answer scholars’ calls for qualitative prison studies on how women respond to, cope with, and even demonstrate resistance to the prison environment

Objectives

Methods

Findings

Discussion

Conclusion