Prison Ethnography Research Articles

Moral Policing of Gender Norms: Honor-Based Violence as a Mobilizing Factor Towards Militant Islamism

Honor culture, in which the virtue of the family—if not community—depends on the “purity” of its female members, enforced through “moral policing” of gender norms to collectively control women’s sexuality and uphold a patriarchal gender order, is a central aspect of both honor-based violence and the Salafi-jihadist culture in militant Islamist milieus. Drawing on interviews with 1) an imprisoned Danish woman convicted of ISIS-related terrorism, 2) a mother of a deceased Swedish ISIS foreign fighter, who herself was previously part of the Salafi-jihadist milieu, and 3) “professionals” (e.g. police officers, social workers and municipal employees) conducted during ethnographic fieldwork in Sweden and prison ethnography in Denmark, this article explores how honor-based violence can constitute a mobilizing factor for Western Muslims towards militant Islamism in three distinct ways. First, isolation of Muslim women and children through gender segregation and restrictions on accessing public space to “moral police” gender norms enables the Salafi-jihadist milieu to cement and extend its ideological, religious, and physical control. Second, in an honor culture with intense pressure on men to defend and restore family honor whenever it is challenged, joining ISIS can be perceived as a means to fulfill this obligation, thereby affirming “real” Muslim masculinity and upholding a patriarchal gender order. The deeply ingrained cultural expectations to defend honor can even be exploited by militant Islamist milieus in their recruitment efforts. Third, besides providing a “safe space” where one cannot be persecuted and punished for dishonoring one’s family by leaving it as an unmarried woman, ISIS’s multiethnic diversity and embrace of interethnic marriage can be appealing for someone who wants to escape forced endogamous marriage. Given that honor-based violence strikes at the individual freedoms and rights, thereby undermining liberal democratic values and the rule of law, our article contributes knowledge on the broader threat to democracy from anti-democratic forces in the context of militant Islamism.

Carceral community in the time of COVID-19: Isolation, adaption, and predation

State failures to protect prisoners from COVID-19 have made prisons key “hotspots” of infection, particularly in the “new mass carceral zone” of Latin America. In Guatemala, which has the 3rd most overcrowded prison system in the world, such failure was a tragedy foretold. Longstanding hostility towards criminalized populations ensured that prisoners would be left to fend for themselves. This does not mean, however, that we should cast the prison as merely another “zone of abandonment” nor prisoners as helpless victims. Instead, drawing on the concept of “carceral community” and prison ethnography, this article maps how prisoner-leaders, entrepreneurs, extortionists, visitors, and officials navigate the absurd contradictions exposed in the collision between pandemic protection protocols and prison realities. This article explores a disavowed carceral community's efforts to make sense of, adapt to, and leverage the pandemic's constraints in the never-ending struggle to survive, profit from, and project power over and beyond prison life. The informal and the illicit articulate with government pandemic policies to create a volatile but deeply resilient modus vivendi, albeit with dire consequences for the most vulnerable on both sides of prison walls.

Prison ethnography by correspondence?

Prison ethnography by correspondence?

Prison ethnography by correspondence?

Prison ethnography offers researchers a unique vantage point from which to explore the relationships, power dynamics, degradations, solidarities and sensory assaults which occur within the prison walls. Yet, despite the valuable insights to be gained from this methodological approach, prison ethnographies can be extremely challenging to conduct. Institutional pressures arising from both the prison and the contemporary University pose considerable obstacles for researchers, and the outbreak of Covid-19 has heightened these barriers further still. This article will argue that the methodology of cultural probes can preserve at least some of the ethos of ethnographic research when conducting research by correspondence. It will reflect on the methodological and ethical challenges of this approach, and critically discuss its potential to offer a more participatory and less extractive means for researching the nuances of prison life while collecting data from a distance.

Carceral ethnography in a time of pandemic: Examining migrant detention and deportation during COVID-19

Each year the United States government detains and deports hundreds of thousands of people who prior to their removal are held in confinement for an average of 55 days. The short and long-term effects of the coronavirus pandemic on migrant detention and deportation continue to be evaluated in real time, including how we can best study it. This paper provides a timely analysis on the relationship between immigration enforcement and confinement, public health emergencies, and ethnographic methods. It makes two contributions. The first is methodological and focuses on the challenges and opportunities of ethnographic methods in carceral settings when pandemic-related protocols have raised additional challenges to conventional in-person prison ethnography. The second contribution is empirical and documents how we adapted ethnographic methods to an interdisciplinary research design and to the exigencies of the pandemic to study the spread of the coronavirus in four immigrant detention facilities in New Jersey, USA.

Prisons as total institution semiospheres

The main objective of this article is to combine Juri Lotman’s theory of the semiosphere – including its concepts of boundary, core, and periphery – with Erving Goffman’s theory of the total institution. The purpose is to develop a framework conducive to examining the prison as an object of study, equally emphasizing both its internal as well as external relations. This work positions itself within the contexts of the relative decline of the field of prison ethnography, few or no studies done applying semiotic metalanguage to the prison or the total institution, and none applying the theory of the semiosphere to either. This work is oriented according to an analytical or neutral mode; its point is not to offer a normative programme, but to offer a new description of the research object and a new language of description in which to speak of this object. The secondary objectives of this article include demonstrating that Lotman’s theory of the semiosphere and Goffman’s theory of the total institution are compatible, that Lotman’s theory actually refines Goffman’s original, that Lotman’s theory taken independently and Goffman’s theory as refined by Lotman’s are both compatible with the direction of contemporary prison ethnography, and that the framework presented in this work has the potential to reinvigorate the field of prison ethnography.

Punishing Fieldwork: Penal Domination and Prison Ethnography

Ethnographic studies inside prisons are especially difficult to execute. In addition to facing amplified challenges in gaining site access, earning subjects’ trust, and tolerating the exhaustion of fieldwork, researchers who collect participant observation and in-depth interview data behind bars must confront an explicit asymmetrical power relation. Prison ethnographers penetrate, to varying levels of depth, a social universe where staff dominate prisoners and where prisoners, largely in response to the pains of their imprisonment, carve paths to dignity. This paper considers how and where non-staff and non-incarcerated ethnographers can awkwardly fit into (or fail out of) this space. Drawing on insights from two ethnographic studies in the United States, the authors detail their particular and common experiences across three phases: access, collection, and exit. These experiences motivate a description of prison ethnography as “punishing fieldwork.” Such research is not only exacting, it is also significantly contained and directed by penal power.

Reflections on the Performance of Emotion, Masculinity, and Position Within a Prison Ethnography.

In this article, a selection of emotionally charged situations encountered while conducting an ethnographic research project in a prison in the United Kingdom are outlined and analyzed. With reference to three impressionistic field notes, the researcher's responses to interpersonal challenges, and subsequent attempts at impression management, particularly in relation to maintaining a broadly "neutral" and "credible" status are described. The challenges were experienced in the context of the researcher's position within the hierarchical and gendered nature of prison culture; it is argued that the subsequent subjective feelings of ambivalence are characteristic of the relational uncertainties found within prison settings. Reflecting on the impact of emotionally loaded interpersonal encounters helps to support and enrich the quality of the analysis and research. Furthermore, the learning from this process may help researchers undertaking fieldwork in other closed institutions with similar features and with other vulnerable populations.

Afterword

In this afterword, I consider some of the important insights that are generated in this special issue. The thorough and detailed consideration of the ways in which detainees and formerly incarcerated persons survive confinement and the constraints imposed on them illustrates the power of ethnography. Each of the contributions builds on strong empirical material and sometimes decade-long engagement with people in and on the brink of confining institutions. In this way, the contributions form a comprehensive empirical foundation for understanding confinement beyond the carceral institutions, while also allowing us to ask new kinds of questions about confinement beyond site. While firmly rooted in prison ethnography, the special issue thus inspires urban studies and anthropologists more broadly to think concertedly about the role of confinement, not only as the fate of many urban residents but as an ever-present element of the urban imaginary and of urban life.

Prison Ethnography in Africa: Reflections on a Maturing Field

On peut aujourd’hui affirmer que les études sur les prisons dans les pays du Sud sont arrivées à maturité. Dans cet article, nous nous appuyons sur près de vingt années de recherches ethnographiques sur les prisons « au-delà de l’Occident » pour analyser ce processus de maturation. Il n’est plus possible de considérer que les prisons africaines n’ont pas été soumises au regard empirique des sciences sociales ou que tout ce que nous savons sur le sujet est fondé sur des rapports relatifs au non-respect des droits de l’homme. Le champ a connu des progrès, aussi modestes soient-ils, tant en termes de couverture spatiale que de portée analytique. Nous montrons ici en quoi cette appréhension ethnographique de l’Afrique carcérale a suscité une reconceptualisation à contre-courant des prisons, en les considérant comme relationnelles et poreuses plutôt qu’asociales, non conformes et coupées du monde. Nous identifions également deux grandes tendances actuelles en matière pénale (l’extension du filet carcéral et la gestion de l’extrémisme violent) qui appellent à des recherches plus approfondies sur les prisons en Afrique et au-delà.

Sex offenders, sex and thesub rosaprison economy

A wealth of literature exists detailing the nature and extent of sexual activity in the US penal estate while little attention has been paid to the subject in English prisons. The purpose of this article is to explore the nature of sexual activity occurring in a medium security sex offender only prison in England. Based on a six-month prison ethnography including 30 semi-structured interviews, it will be shown that sex offenders engage in sexual activity whilst in prison despite the prohibition on sexual activity. For sex offenders, prison sex is not solely about the performance of masculinities, power and dominance, but was instead used for sexual gratification and the sexual exploitation of others. The exploitative nature of the sexual activity was inextricably linked to the sub rosa economy of the prison. As such, prison sex for sex offenders is qualitatively different to previous depictions of prison sex among mainstream offenders.

Этнография зоны по Параджанову

In the article, the prison period of Sergei Parajanov’s art is examined – Parajanov served his sentence in 1973–1977 in the high security camps in Ukraine. Following the graphic works, collages and film scenarios which he created in the prison, one can conceive of the everyday life in the Soviet prison of 1970s –1980s, more than that, get an outline of the ethnography of the Soviet prison. Parajanov often uses ethnographic realities and attributes in his movies, some of these movies are even considered to be a specific variety of ethnographic cinema. However, there is an opinion that the film director, while reflecting ethnographic realities, no less created pseudoethnographic ones. In this regard, his works of the prison period are something different from the usual Parajanovian fantasies. Unlike the authors who studied the ethnography of the prison, even those who relied on their own experience (for example, L. Samoilov), Parajanov created a significant part of his works of prison content in the camp, like an ethnographer in the field, although there are also works that he created or supplemented after prison, again like an ethnographer, relying on his field notes. In other words, his works of the prison period are much closer to the genre of ethnography than his “ethnographic” films. The article also discusses the problem of the representation of Parajanov’s works of the prison period in the museums. Are they samples of prison art, a representation of a certain period in the author’s biography, or a kind of the prison ethnography?

Challenging Prison Officers’ Discretion: “Good Reasons” to Treat Courteously Mafiosi in Custody in Italy

Prison ethnography has long touched on the central role of prison officers’ discretion. Nowadays, a large number of sociologists and criminologists share the assumption that prison officers have de facto to resort to discretional decisions continuously to be able to translate the law into practice as they go about their job. This paper addresses the topic of prison officers’ discretion differently by adopting analytic autoethnography and Carolyn Ellis’ emotional recall. It outlines four officers’ “good reasons” for cooperating with mafiosi in custody—treating them with good manner—rather than showing neutrality as they would do with “ordinary” prisoners. The main good reasons that ground mafiosi–officers relationships are (1) reciprocal institutional recognition that Italian criminal justice and high-ranking mafia prisoners recognize one another; (2) mafioso capacity to help officers to “govern” fellow prisoners in practice; (3) the social embeddedness of the mafia both inside and outside prison; and, lastly, (4) prison officers’ fear of retaliation.

Prison Ethnography: A “Serendipitous Journey” of Discovery of the Brazilian PCCSharing This Walk: An Ethnography of Prison Life and the PCC in Brazil. By Karina Biondi, edited and translated by John F. Collins. Durham, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2016.

Prison Ethnography: A “Serendipitous Journey” of Discovery of the Brazilian PCC<i>Sharing This Walk: An Ethnography of Prison Life and the PCC in Brazil</i>. By Karina Biondi, edited and translated by John F. Collins. Durham, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2016.

Photo-elicitation in prison ethnography: Breaking the ice in the field and unpacking prison officers’ use of force

Research papers on prisons have occasionally been illustrated with photographs. Yet rarely have visual methods been used critically in prison ethnography; image-making and images themselves have been used illustratively rather than as constitutive sites of knowledge production and, therefore, as objects to be interrogated in their own right by the researcher through, for example, participant collaboration. This paper focuses on the use of ‘photo-elicitation’ interviewing as a method for unpacking prison officers’ use of force. The discussion is based on an ethnography conducted inside an Italian custodial complex that hosts both a forensic psychiatric hospital and a prison. Prison officers, psychiatric staff and prisoners were invited to discuss a number of images produced by the researcher–in the wing where they were working and/or living–representing the use of force and violence, thereby helping the researcher to address what Joe Sim (2008: 187) calls an ‘inconvenient criminological truth’ and at the same time giving the participants a voice.

An Examination of the Researcher Guard Role: Bringing Prison Fieldwork into the 21st Century

In 1986, James Marquart published a seminal article on qualitative methodology in Justice Quarterly. In that piece he presented the strengths and weaknesses associated with the researcher guard role he used while conducting a prison ethnography in Texas. His method led to data that is still central to our understanding of prison culture. However, in the past 30 years, correctional philosophy and practice have undergone significant shifts in the United States. Despite these shifts, there has been a dramatic decrease in prison ethnography during the same time period. This article presents a modern adaptation of Marquart’s method, based on a recently completed ethnography of officer culture in a Midwestern state.

Etnografias da prisão: novas direções

Este artigo traca o panorama atual da investigacao de terreno sobre a reclusao penal, identificando linhas de evolucao e caracterizando-as em relacao a temas-chave e debates classicos. Procurando internacionalizar mais esta discussao atraves de um alargamento do habitual enfoque nos EUA e no mundo anglofono, o texto organiza-se em torno de uma questao: a ligacao prisao-sociedade e a articulacao entre o mundo intra e extramuros. Esta articulacao e focada a partir de varias perspetivas e escalas de analise, ora mais centradas na instituicao e no seu funcionamento, ora nos/as prisioneiros/as e no seu mundo social, dentro e fora da prisao. A porosidade das fronteiras prisionais tambem foi problematizada e etnografada de diferentes maneiras, entre abordagens da “prisao-em-contexto” e abordagens de “interface”, ambas agora mais reflexivas e entrosadas com debates teoricos mais amplos.

Prison Ethnography as Lived Experience

This article reflects on my own experiences as a prison researcher and my position within the cultural web of the prison society. From the first minute of the first day of fieldwork, I entered into perpetual negotiations about my position in the prison and my proper place in the ever-present struggle between (various factions of) prisoners and officers. Entering a prison as a researcher is both scary and exciting. How would I be greeted? Would I be accepted? Where would I fit in? What is the correct degree of closeness and distance between a researcher and the researched in such an environment? How can one best relate to and balance the very different positions that are being ascribed to you, such as “suspicious stranger,” “responsible professional,” “unwanted intruder,” and “trusted confidant”? With excerpts from my fieldnotes, I reveal my own thoughts and feelings about entering the prison for the first time, struggling to fit in and, finally, settling in to the field while remaining alert to the potential minefields surrounding me. I also describe my responses to the performative expectations of masculinity that made me “legible” and to some extent “legitimate” in the eyes of prisoners and prison staff.

“Mr S, you do have sexual fantasies?” The Parole Hearing and Treatment of a Sex Offender at the Turn of the 21st Century

How does the Parole Board decide a sex offender is rehabilitated and can be released into the community? This case study of a parole hearing reveals the significance the Parole Board gives to a sex offender’s management of his arousal as a clear sign of his rehabilitation. To explain the Board’s preoccupation with a sex offender’s sexual fantasies and arousal, I draw on a prison ethnography of a sex offender treatment program. Rehabilitation as risk management relies on the development of a crime cycle and relapse prevention plan designed to grasp the connection between fantasies, arousal and offending. I argue the parole hearing and treatment program exist in a symbiotic relationship that fabricates the sex offender into a species larger than life, one at risk of offending all the time. Key words: rehabilitation, sex offenders, parole, sexual fantasies, ethnography, prison.

“Mr S, you do have sexual fantasies?” The Parole Hearing and Treatment of a Sex Offender at the Turn of the 21st Century

How does the Parole Board decide a sex offender is rehabilitated and can be released into the community? This case study of a parole hearing reveals the significance the Parole Board gives to a sex offender’s management of his arousal as a clear sign of his rehabilitation. To explain the Board’s preoccupation with a sex offender’s sexual fantasies and arousal, I draw on a prison ethnography of a sex offender treatment program. Rehabilitation as risk management relies on the development of a crime cycle and relapse prevention plan designed to grasp the connection between fantasies, arousal and offending. I argue the parole hearing and treatment program exist in a symbiotic relationship that fabricates the sex offender into a species larger than life, one at risk of offending all the time.&#x0D; &#x0D; Key words: rehabilitation, sex offenders, parole, sexual fantasies, ethnography, prison.