Women And Prison

This paper reflects on a century of maternal imprisonment in the United Kingdom. Examining the historical context of incarcerated mothers, grandmothers and mothers -to be, it explores the relationship between patriarchy, religion, culture, motherhood ideology and criminal justice. Revealing how each has been and continues to be inextricably linked to frustrate, disadvantage and discriminate against mothers who break the law. Drawing on the extensive research of the authors, 1 this paper brings the conversation into the 21st Century. Centring the voices of mothers we highlight mothers’ own experiences of their incarceration, revealing the profound hurt of imprisoned motherhood. The paper is concluded with recommendations drawn from our respective research and activism.

La ponencia está estructurada, en un primer momento, en torno a la exposición de los dispositivos feminizantes que se emplean en la cárcel para normalizar la identidad de género y el cuerpo de las mujeres presas En un segundo momento, ahondaré en las prácticas de subversión corporal que construyen las presas alrededor de unas formas alternas de sociabilidad, que  configuran un sistema de sexo/género vernáculo que otorga identidades masculinas y femeninas entre las presas, transgrediendo el orden que decreta el sexo como una categoría biológica, natural y determinante del género. Este sistema de sexo/género que opera en la sociabilidad de las
presas, emerge como una estructura de interacción social que cuestiona las normas feminizantes del encierro, un acto paródico de los roles heteronormativos de la masculinidad y la feminidad, y un proceso que inaugura nuevas subjetividades que van más allá de las categorías hombre-mujer, empleando taxonomías prácticas y cotidianas (Halberstam, 2008) como las categorías ―chacho‖ y
―femenina‖. Sobre este panorama, argumento que en la cárcel las mujeres presas configuran prácticas de transgresión del cuerpo, el sexo y el género, a través de una confrontación permanente con las tecnologías disciplinarias del penal. Asimismo, la especificidad de la cárcel como un espacio sui generis, posibilita que en medio de la deshumanización y la violencia cotidiana, emerjan prácticas de exploración de la sexualidad, desestabilización del habitus de
género y subversiones corporales que revelan el carácter sexista y conservador de las prisiones femeninas.

The modern model of penal control of crime and criminal it constitutes intermixture of the systems that were applied occasionally.
Besides, it is characterized by its internationalisation, which begins –traditionally henceforth– from the USA and is scattered in the entire
world. The prisons, internationally, present common characteristics traits as they are: the continuous increase of their population,
the“overpopulation“, the large number of foreigners, pre-judicial people and large majority of men condemned for laws about narcotics,
etc. According to the last record of World Prison Population List, what is based on elements that were available up to in October 2006,
more from 9,25 millions persons are jailed worldwide and most as prejudged despite as condemning. In our country, as in other countries
of Western world, its correctional population increased iniquitous the last fifteen years. In the study that follows we will present tendencies
of incarceration the last decades in Greece compared to other countries and the problems that result from the squalid conditions of
imprisonment and violation of fundamental human rights of inmates.

Ésta es una aproximación a los perfiles de las mujeres encarceladas, marcados en su gran mayoría por la exclusión social previa al encarcelamiento y por la posición social desigual en cuanto a su condición de mujeres. Con el doble objetivo de visibilizar a las mujeres en el sistema penitenciario y de aportar una visión crítica feminista que permita acabar con el tradicional sesgo androcéntrico de los estudios sobre las cárceles, se presentan algunos resultados elaborados a partir de las entrevistas semiestructuradas realizadas en el departamento de mujeres de la cárcel de Nanclares de Oca (Euskadi), prestando atención a los aspectos relativos a sus rasgos socioeconómicos. Se han incluido temas relevantes de cara a comprender las trayectorias vitales de las mujeres presas, tales como su posición en el ámbito doméstico, la maternidad o la violencia de género.

" While women weep, as they do now, I " ll fight; while children go hungry, as they do now I " ll fight; while there is a poor lost girl upon the streets, while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I " ll fight, I " ll fight to the very end! "-William Booth

La investigación acerca de las mujeres encarceladas es muy escasa en nuestro contexto. Más aún si nos referimos a problemáticas específicas que pueden determinar tanto las trayectorias vitales, como las circunstancias del delito y el encarcelamiento, como en el caso del consumo de drogas. Con el presente artículo pretendo hacer una aportación en este rea de estudio en la intersección
entre las políticas de penalización de colectivos en exclusión social y la estigmatización de determinadas formas y contextos de consumo de drogas, donde la construcción de género juega un papel importante. Presento los resultados del estudio empírico realizado en el módulo de mujeres de una cárcel vasca referidos
a los perfi les sociodemográfi cos de las mujeres estudiadas, su situación penal y penitenciaria, y diferentes circunstancias de su vida íntima (pareja, maternidad y violencia). Como base para la interpretación de estos resultados, me baso en estudios feministas acerca del encarcelamiento de mujeres, así como los estudios de género en el campo del consumo de drogas, quienes ponen un énfasis especial en el estigma que estas circunstancias de exclusión social conlleva para las mujeres consumidoras de drogas que han sido penalizadas.

This report addresses a worrying gap in the knowledge about the effective resettlement of girls and young women. Reviewing research literature in a number of relevant areas, it cross-references evidence of what works in the resettlement of young people with what we know about the wider need of girls and young women. This iterative synthesis approach thus provides a gender-sensitive approach to inform policy and practice development in resettlement for this specific group.

A partir del estudio empírico realizado en el módulo de mujeres de una cárcel vasca, en el artículo se argumenta que la experiencia del encarcelamiento tiene un impacto en las emociones y los cuerpos de las mujeres presas que se trasluce en un deterioro de su salud mental, y en la vivencia de una sexualidad mediada por la institución penitenciaria. Respecto a la salud, se constata un empeoramiento del estado general, especialmente en lo que se refiere a la salud mental o al estado psicoemocional. Las entrevistadas manifiestan haber padecido ataques de ansiedad, depresión y, en algunos casos, intentos de suicidio. La respuesta del personal sanitario de la prisión es una prescripción excesiva de medicamentos, a la que algunas presas se oponen de manera explícita. En lo que respecta a la vivencia de su sexualidad, nos centramos en los encuentros sexuales en la cárcel (llamados vis a vis íntimos), que las participantes definen como negativos en la medida en que tienen lugar en un espacio carcelario, en un día y hora fijadas por la institución, y bajo la mirada del personal de la prisión.

Drawing on the empirical research conducted within a women’s unit in a Basque prison, the article argues that the experience
of incarceration has an impact on the emotions and bodies of women in prison, which is made visible in the
deterioration of the mental health and the experience of sexuality mediated by the penitentiary institution. Regarding
their health, the general status gets worse, especially in respect of their mental health or psych emotional situation. Interviewees
expressed having suffered from nervous breakdowns, depression and suicide attempts in some cases. The
response of the medical staff of the prison is excessive prescription of drugs, to which some dams oppose explicitly. Regarding
the experience of sexuality, we focus on sexual encounters in prison (called Vis a Vis intimate), defined by the
participants as negative as they take place in a prison space, in a day and time set by the institution, and under the gaze
of prison staff.

Facebook is a leading social networking site across the world. Facebook has allowed its users to access political information and can freely express their views to others. Presently, there are almost 32 million Facebook users in Pakistan. Majority of them are young people and they use this platform form retrieving political information and expressing their views about Pakistani politics. This study was designed to see the effect of students' age and academic performance (GPA) on their political participation; to investigate a relationship between general Facebook use and political participation of the students; to examine specific use of Facebook for seeking and sharing political information and its relationship with political participation of the students. The research was conducted with social sciences students studying at International Islamic University Islamabad. 158 undergraduate students were randomly selected from sociology, education, political science and mass communication. The results showed that Facebook use for retrieving political information determined political participation of young Pakistani Facebook users. Nonetheless, Facebook use for general purposes, age and academic performance of young adults did not predict their political participation. The possible implications of these findings are also discussed.

This research report is based on a small scale study exploring the impact of short custodial sentences on mothers. The study reveals highlights the significant harm caused to these 17 mothers and their fifty children. The report, heavy with the voices of the mothers, describes challenges they faced, to their mental and physical health,  challenges regarding contact with children, lack of support during and after custody and difficulties in their relationships post custody. The mothers in the study describe the very real impact their custodial sentences have on both themselves and their children, despite being only weeks as opposed to months long. The report echoes previous findings of the harm caused by imprisoning mothers,  and concludes by making recommendations for positive change, and suggestions for further research.

RESÚMEN
El artículo presenta diferentes perfiles y problemáticas de las mujeres encarceladas desde una perspectiva de género. Lo común a todas ellas es que se encuentran en espacios precarios, alejados de sus lugares de origen y que cuentan con menores actividades formativas. Sometidas a un tratamiento paternalista y estereotipado de género, sus principales preocupaciones derivan de su papel de madres y de sus carencias en las relaciones familiares. La inmensa mayoría provienen de estratos sociales bajos, producto de la selección social, penal y penitenciaria. El eje presencia/ausencia de una pareja masculina en sus vidas parece tener relevancia en sus trayectorias. Al mismo tiempo, muchas mujeres no encarceladas tienen que padecer las consecuencias de la prisión de una u otra manera. Ellas son las parejas, esposas y otras familiares de quienes se encuentran encarcelados y encarceladas.

ABSTRACT
The article presents several profiles and issues of women incarcerated from a gender perspective. They are situated in precarious spaces, far from their places of origin and they have minor formative activities. Having been submitted to a paternalistic and stereotyped treatment of gender, their main concerns are those of motherhood and their gaps in family relationships. Most of them come from the lowest social status, a product of the social, penal and penitentiary selection. The key presence/absence of a male companion in their lives, seems to be relevant for their development. At the same time, many women, not incarcerated, have somehow to suffer the consequences of the prison system. They are the companions, wives, and other relatives of those incarcerated.

This thesis examines women’s political imprisonment in Franco’s Spain, focussing on the literary production of the inmates of the Cárcel de Ventas women’s prison in Madrid. In analysing the prison writings of Juana Doña, Mercedes Núñez Targa and Ángeles García Madrid, it proposes that these texts allow their authors to create a narrative space wherein the Republican female prisoner is able to re-construct and re-assert her own identity, selfhood and subjectivity in the face of imprisonment. In this sense, this work contends that the carceral testimony of these women stands as a form of resistance against the silencing frame of incarceration and Francoist repression. In its exploration of the construction of the self within each narrative, this thesis also analyses the narratives’ construction of solidarity, femininity and sincerity within the prison, arguing that these each constitute a means of opposing the dehumanisation of the Republican woman. Finally, combining an analysis of the testimonial text with a consideration of each author’s position as a subaltern subject during the time of the dictatorship, it proposes a new understanding of this subaltern position in a modern, twenty- first century context, which troubles the conception of the prisoner narrative as an unheard story. This research thus offers a new perspective on the Republican woman’s prison text, allowing for a thorough examination of its role as a view from inside of history.

Paraguay is a country marked by inequality and corruption. A large portion of the population lives in poverty, and health and education are not universally available. As a country, Paraguay lacks a system of social protection, and its residents are expected to solve their problems by themselves. Paraguayans are nestled in the sluggish beliefs imposed by the previous military dictatorship and the current economic dictatorship, whereby rights are nothing more than privileges—in other words, in order to enjoy certain things, one must earn their keep. Public institutions have not evolved into what they should be and have not been placed at the service of citizens. Seventy percent of the population is engaged in informal labor and lacks health insurance (Robles 2012). Paraguay has the worst public education in Latin America (UNESCO 2015); the ranks of the poor and urban ghettos are on the rise, and marginalized populations are growing. It is a country marked by hardship and a population that is past its prime. It seems to me that Paraguayans see this state of affairs—that is, structural social exclusion—as natural, and we are unaware of the importance of the dignity inherent in people’s lives, both their own and those of others. And amidst this context of indignity exists a group of people who are the very worst off. This group, whom I will focus on in this chapter, is those who are deprived of their liberty.

Aboriginal women are the fastest growing sector of the prison population in Australia. Over the last 10 years, the female prison population has increased by 60 per cent (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2013). Aboriginal women are massively over represented in the prison population. While approximately two percent of the Australian female population identify as being of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent, Indigenous women make up one third of the female prison population. Offences committed by Aboriginal women are commonly those associated with extreme poverty, such as non-payment of fines, shop-lifting, driving and alcohol related offences and welfare fraud (Baldry 2013). Over the last 10 years there have been, however, significant increases in imprisonment for offences such as robbery, theft, assault and homicide.

Almost all Aboriginal women in prison come from economically and disadvantaged backgrounds. The majority of women prisoners are themselves victims of crime, with many being the survivors of physical and sexual abuse. Most were in care as a child, with many having experienced childhood sexual assault and imprisonment. Most women were unemployed prior to incarceration with few having completed secondary education. Many Aboriginal women experience sexual abuse and racism at an early age, have repeated failures at school and come from families where excessive alcohol use, substance abuse, offending and violence are behavioural norms (Baldry et al. 2009). Larger numbers of Aboriginal women are coming into prison having experienced homelessness and having cognitive impairments (commonly from traumatic events such as vehicle accidents or domestic violence), sometimes from foetal alcohol spectrum disorder (Grant 2014).

This research report is based on a small scale study exploring the impact of short custodial sentences on mothers. The study reveals highlights the significant harm caused to these 17 mothers and their fifty children. The report, heavy with the voices of the mothers, describes challenges they faced, to their mental and physical health, challenges regarding contact with children, lack of support during and after custody and difficulties in their relationships post custody. The mothers in the study describe the very real impact their custodial sentences have on both themselves and their children, despite being only weeks as opposed to months long. The report echoes previous findings of the harm caused by imprisoning mothers, and concludes by making recommendations for positive change, and suggestions for further research.

Research in Ireland and internationally has documented a strong
association between homelessness and incarceration. Nonetheless, the dynamics of this relationship are poorly understood. Although research suggests that the experience of incarceration among the homeless may have gender-specific dimensions, women have been largely ignored in the literature, which has tended to focus on the male experience. This paper examines the incarceration experiences of a sub-sample of women who are participants in a larger biographical study of women’s homelessness in Ireland. It charts their paths to incarceration and explores women’s perspectives on prison as well as their experiences post-release. Rather than a discrete life event, incarceration emerged as an extension of an institutional circuit that served to exacerbate their marginalisation and diminish their prospects of securing stable housing.

La série-télé Unité 9, écrite par Danielle Trottier et produite par Fabienne Larouche, jouit d’un succès critique et populaire depuis sa mise en ondes sur la chaîne nationale (ICI Radio-Canada Télé) en septembre 2012. La série, dont la quatrième saison sera mise à l’antenne en septembre 2015, est le fruit de plusieurs années de recherche et de rencontres en milieu carcéral menées par la scénariste. La première saison d’Unité 9 (2012-2013) débute avec l’arrivée à la prison de Lietteville de Marie Lamontagne (Guylaine Tremblay), une enseignante de lycée sans dossier judiciaire qui vient d’être condamnée pour le crime de son père. Veuve depuis quelques années déjà, Marie est maman de deux grands enfants (Léa et Sébastien). C’est par l’intermédiaire du personnage de Marie, une femme éduquée et respectable, que les spectateurs et spectatrices entrent dans l’univers carcéral de ces femmes dont l’intimité sera mise à nue au fil des épisodes.
L’intimité féminine est révélée par la mise en scène des relations affectives entre les détenues, qu’elles soient de nature amicale, amoureuse et/ou sexuelle. La représentation de la sexualité dans les séries québécoises ayant été peu abordée, et d’autant qu’il s’agit, dans ce cas-ci, principalement de relations sexuelles entre femmes (mais non exclusivement), Unité 9 s’avère un terreau fertile pour l’étude des rapports et des imaginaires sexuels féminins. Il s’agira donc, dans cet article, d’analyser la mise en scène de la sexualité des femmes à partir de personnages clés présents dès la première saison (ex. Shandy Galarneau, Jeanne Biron, Michèle Paquette et Suzanne Beauchemin). Le développement des personnages, et ce faisant l’évolution de leurs relations intimes, permettra de définir les différents types de discours sur la sexualité circulant à l’intérieur des murs, de même que la variété des sexualités présentes à Lietteville. Les approches féministes et queer seront privilégiées, afin de mettre à l’avant-plan non seulement la complexité des personnages féminins, qui ne relèvent pas du stéréotype, mais également la marginalisation de l’univers carcéral féminin, qui n’a rien à voir avec l’imagerie de la prison des hommes, et dans lequel la sexualité peut être vécue et comprise comme « déviante ». Ainsi, l’étude de la représentation des sexualités dans Unité 9 tirera profit des réflexions de Judith Butler, pour qui le terme « sexualité » renvoie à la fois aux désirs (fantasmes) comme aux pratiques sexuelles (rapports sexuels), sans aucun rapport de subordination. Il sera donc intéressant de voir dans quelle mesure les désirs et pratiques sexuelles peuvent s’éloigner (temporairement ou non) de l’orientation sexuelle vécue avant l’incarcération. La place de la spectatrice sera aussi discutée, d’autant que la série, qui met en scène un univers féminin marginalisé, a été créée, écrite et produite par des femmes.

Éléments bibliographiques :
Bourcier, Marie-Hélène, Queer Zones, Politique des identités sexuelles, des représentations et des savoirs, Paris : Balland « modernes », 2001.
Butler, Judith, Trouble dans le genre : Pour un féminisme de la subversion (Trad. Cynthia Kraus), Paris : La Découverte, 2005.
Mulvey, Laura, Visual and Other Pleasures, Bloomington & Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1989.

Using ethnographic data gathered at a mandated, community-based drug treatment program for women offenders, this article analyzes how gendered notions of the self and of autonomy shape penal governance. This study examines how psychological models of women’s deviance, racialized visions of motherhood, and therapeutic techniques of the self come into tension with expectations of responsible, autonomous citizenship. The program prioritized therapeutic ways of governing its clients over those that emphasized economic self-reliance, rational decision making, and normalizing gender. This is because staff attributed criminal and addictive behaviors to women’s inadequate self-understanding and lack of emotional autonomy in personal relations. Staff discouraged women’s motherhood and paid labor because they saw these external obligations as a threat to women’s autonomous selfhood. This research complicates claims that contemporary forms of penal treatment manage offenders through rational incentives and personal responsibility by pointing to the ways that subject formation is a gendered process.
http://gas.sagepub.com/content/22/3/303.short

** Winner of the 2014 Best Public Intellectual Special Issue Award of the US Council of Editors of Learned Journals, Modern Language Association (MLA).

This special issue explores power and resistance under extreme conditions of confinement in the United States and heretofore understudied non-Anglophone jurisdictions such as Brazil, Ecuador, Honduras, Palestine, and Greece. There follows the journal’s regular ‘Against the Day’ section, with shorter essays on power and resistance in Guantánamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and the US immigration detention system.

In the last decade research surrounding ‘maternal imprisonment’, has become more visible, the topic has garnered interest and attention in the UK in a way it had not previously enjoyed. For example, existing UK research includes; explored maternal imprisonment and the rights of the child in sentencing (Epstein, 2012; Minson 2014; Prison Reform Trust, 2015), young motherhood, stigma and prison, (Sharpe, 2015), maternal imprisonment and the wider impact on the family (Booth, 2017; Masson, 2014), and maternal identity and maternal emotion Baldwin, 2015, 2017, 2018; Lockwood, 2013; Rowe, 2011). However, except for Baldwin, 2017, 2018, less well documented, are the long-term effects of maternal imprisonment, both in relation to the wider family and for mothers themselves. This paper, drawing on the authors own research, seeks to explore the longer-term impact for post-release mothers. The chapter, drawing on interviews, questionnaires, letters from across several research projects, will explore particularly, the long-term impact of imprisonment on maternal identity and emotions. Mothers in the research described how they assumed that release from prison would mean a ‘return to normal’, that life would carry on much as it has prior to their sentence. The reality was however that mothers felt forever ‘tainted’ (Baldwin, 2017), by their prison experience, they felt like ‘failures’’ as mothers, and this pervading sense of now being a ‘bad mother’ affected their relationships with their children and families and their own self-worth. These post-prison mothers and grandmothers described struggling to reintegrate into their families, to re-establish themselves in their previous roles. They described amongst other things, feeling ‘judged’, ‘powerless’, ‘suicidal’, ‘invisible’ in their own homes. The longed-for release had brought with it many issues the women had not anticipated nor prepared for, and this had an impact on their ability to cope, and sometimes on their desistance. If we are to continue to send mothers to prison, and arguably the preferred option is wherever possible we don’t; then more must be done to support mothers and children affected by the criminal justice system. This paper highlights the relevance and importance of emotionally supporting mothers both during the custodial period and importantly, post-release in the community. Working with mothers via a matricentric criminological approach, assisting them to maintain an active mothering role during their sentence will prove beneficial in terms of maintaining relationships. Supporting mothers and families in the often-challenging period of re-integration will assist successful resettlement. Failure to do so may impact negatively, not only positive outcomes for mothers themselves but also on the mothers’ ability to engage in sentence planning/supervision and therefore resistance. Which ultimately will further impact on the children and wider society. The chapter provides the post-prison context in an edited collection focussing on issues related to mothers in prison. It is an original contribution to knowledge based on my research findings.

This is an abstract from a Human Rights Watch Report to which Dr. Rosga contributed pro bono expertise. See link below to access full report.

Being a woman prisoner in U.S. state prisons can be a terrifying experience. If you are sexually abused, you cannot escape from your abuser. Grievance or investigatory procedures, where they exist, often do not work, and correctional employees continue to engage in abuse because they believe they can get away with it. The sexual misconduct documented in “All Too Familiar” takes many forms. Male correctional employees vaginally, anally, and orally rape female prisoners and sexually assault and abuse them. In some instances, male officers violate their most basic professional duty and engage in sexual contact with female prisoners absent the use of force or offer of any material exchange. Despite the growing number of women at risk and its obligations under domestic and international law, the U.S. government has largely abdicated its responsibility to guarantee in any meaningful way that the women who are incarcerated in its state prisons are not being sexually abused by those in authority over them.

This summary, taken from the Doctoral research of the author, extracts the key recommendations and findings from the original research. The report focus is on the Mothers' voices and the way forward. The report centers on the descriptions of the 43 mothers who contributed to the study, and who through letters and interviews revealed the significant impact of maternal imprisonment. The report reveals the missed and lost opportunities to support mothers and motherhood before, during, and after prison. The mothers powerfully describe their pain and challenges through their criminal justice journeys and beyond. Many mothers and grandmothers describe how they and their children and grandchildren continue to be deeply affected by maternal imprisonment, sometimes even decades post-release. The mothers reveal how their maternal identity, their maternal emotions, and their maternal experiences intertwine with their experiences of the criminal justice system and how ultimately this has relevance to their rehabilitation and desistance. The report concludes with recommendations for policy and practice change that if implemented would make a significant difference in the lives of criminalised mothers and their children.

This article critically discusses  sentencing decisions and process in relation to women, specifically mothers.It reflects on the failure of Sentencers to take into account guidance as per the HRA article 8 rights of the child.The article introduces a brief outline of proposals for positive change that are being developed in a forthcoming article . The article also highlights the rise in the female prison population and reflects on the appropriateness of custodial sentences for  non serious offences.

More than one in 10 of all prisoners in England and Wales are Foreign Nationals. This article discusses whether the research applications to one London prison are aimed at understanding a prisoner population characterised by significant multinational and multilingual complexity. We studied all accessible documents relating to research undertaken at a women's prison between 2005 and 2009 to assess the involvement of Foreign National prisoners and women with limited English. The source of information was prison research applications and protocols. We also looked at available final research reports and journal articles. Two key findings emerged from this study. First, studies at this prison frequently excluded Foreign National prisoners and women with limited English. Second, Foreign National prisoners were often clustered as a homogeneous category in the research reports reviewed. This is despite their diverse cultural backgrounds, their variable immigration status and their differing competence in English, all of which affect their lives. The failure to include and/or identify social subgroups of the population can undermine the value of research, including, in the case of the study prison, funded health research. This can compromise associated needs assessments and service delivery, particularly important in already disadvantaged populations; this may encourage and/or perpetuate a range of health inequalities. There is a pressing need to examine cultural exclusion in other health and criminal justice settings, to assess the ways in which-and the extent to which-such exclusion may compromise the merit of proposed and completed health and social research.

More than one in 10 of all prisoners in England and Wales are Foreign Nationals. This article discusses whether the research applications to one London prison are aimed at understanding a prisoner population characterised by significant multinational and multilingual complexity. We studied all accessible documents relating to research undertaken at a women's prison between 2005 and 2009 to assess the involvement of Foreign National prisoners and women with limited English. The source of information was prison research applications and protocols. We also looked at available final research reports and journal articles. Two key findings emerged from this study. First, studies at this prison frequently excluded Foreign National prisoners and women with limited English. Second, Foreign National prisoners were often clustered as a homogeneous category in the research reports reviewed. This is despite their diverse cultural backgrounds, their variable immigration status and their differing competence in English, all of which affect their lives. The failure to include and/or identify social subgroups of the population can undermine the value of research, including, in the case of the study prison, funded health research. This can compromise associated needs assessments and service delivery, particularly important in already disadvantaged populations; this may encourage and/or perpetuate a range of health inequalities. There is a pressing need to examine cultural exclusion in other health and criminal justice settings, to assess the ways in which-and the extent to which-such exclusion may compromise the merit of proposed and completed health and social research.

Exploring the benefits of post-secondary education in carceral settings through an autoethnographic reflection from three student participants in the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program, this paper offers context about the Canadian federal prison system, and informs about the effects of a charged political climate surrounding crime. Contrasting the humanizing experiences of participation in the education program against the backdrop of a maximum security prison, this paper highlights the effects produced by neoliberal tough on crime discourses from the standpoints of incarcerated women.

Introduction: This study aimed at examining the psychometric properties of Work Stress Scale for Correctional Officers (WSSCO). Methods: One hundred nineteen correctional officers (109 males and 10 females) employed in Turkey participated in this study. In addition to WSSCO, Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI), Beck Hopelessness Scale (BHS), and Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS) were administered to the participants. Results: The internal consistencies and the item-total correlations were acceptable both for the whole scale and for its subscales; namely, “work overload,” “role conflict and role ambiguity,” “inadequacies in physical conditions of prison,” “threat perception,” and “general problems.” Test–retest reliability coefficient was 0.77 for total scale, and test-retest reliability coefficients ranged between 0.68 and 0.78 for the subscales. The total scale and most of the subscales were positively correlated with depression, anxiety, and hopelessness, and negatively correlated with perceived social support. Furthermore, all subscales significantly differentiated high depressive symptomatology group from the low depressive symptomatology group. Conclusions: The present results revealed that the psychometric properties of WSSCO were quite adequate. The scale can provide a potentially useful tool for research on job stress in correctional officers.

This paper explores the recent PRT paper on the sentencing of mothers- highlighting and summarizing the recommendations and how they may be achieved. The paper highlights the need to take heed of these recommendations -  recommendations which echo many that have been identified as 'the way forward'  before . The report  and the article concludes with the view that positive change cannot be delayed any longer in order to avert ongoing use of unnecessary custodial sentences for women  and the subsequent negative impact this has on  society , the women themselves ,families, in particular ,often already vulnerable children.

During the twentieth century in Australia more than half-a-million children grew up in 'out-of-home' care in over 800 institutions, including children's homes, foster homes, industrial schools and orphanages. A regime of mass institutionalisation was sanctioned by legislation and administered by either the state or by non-government bodies such as churches and welfare groups. Around 7,000 children were child migrants from Britain, Ireland and Malta; up to 50,000 were Indigenous 'Stolen' children and more than 450,000 were non-Indigenous children.

The contributions to this groundbreaking book constitute an eclectic mix of scholarship drawn from a diverse group of historians, social scientists, artists, performers, freelance writers and stakeholders, including former state wards and Forgotten Australians. It demonstrates the breadth and depth of history and memory work that is taking place on and around places of incarceration and confinement in Australia.

This article considers how the contemporary Argentine nation is produced through the regulation of mothering in the federal penitentiary system. The analysis is based on legal narratives of mothering and on women’s social exchanges with female guards. To explore the emotional dimensions of social justice, this article understands prisons as objects of public feelings and as affective economies where emotions circulate. It argues that, through the regulation of mothering in institutions of social control, the nation-state disciplines particular modes of emotional life to foster gendered illusions of belonging for young migrant women and girls. Penal legislation splits mothering into two periods: Until children are four years old, women are regarded solely as biological reproducers of the nation, and mothering is allowed in prison yet exclusively defined as a biological exchange between the bodies of mother and child. However, after the child reaches age four, the fear of moral contamination incarnated in these women constructs them as undesirable agents of cultural transmission to the next generation. The effect is the removal of their children from prison. These two models conceive the future generation’s well-being as dependent on women’s bodies until the children are four years old and, after that, on the fantasy of a nuclear, heterosexual family outside prison. The paradoxical position of incarcerated women vis-à-vis the nation is policed by guards who regulate prison’s affective economies, reducing women’s access to income and goods, shaping the technologies of punishment applied to them, and limiting the forms of agency and social transformation available.