Cries for Help opens a window on the closed world of Holloway, other women's prisons and the lives of those held there in the 1970s. This was an era when personal style and charismatic leadership was the order of the day for governors and prison officers, before ideas of 'new management', when problems were solved using personal initiatives. It catalogues the daily lives of women prisoners, their anxieties, fears and preoccupations. The book looks at a lost segment of the population, hundreds of women who were hidden from view, lacking a voice, part of a system for men that hardly knew what to do with them. It contains stories about murderers and other serious offenders and looks at their personal correspondence, including that of moors murderer Myra Hindley.

Informative, entertaining, against the grain, Her Majesty's Philosophers highlights the artificiality of prison life. By a Guardian correspondent (and with extracts to be published in that newspaper) this book is set to be a penal affairs classic which every student of crime and punishment should read. Building on his Guardian pieces about teaching Philosophy in prison, this is Alan Smith's account in extensio. From introducing Plato to ever-changing groups of hard-nosed prisoners to them wrestling with Bentham, Phillip Larkin and Shakespeare, it is packed with insights and unexpected turns. It paints a picture in which worlds collide and conventional thinking is turned inside out as 'new modes of discourse' change the men's thinking and ideas. At times surreal the book brings fresh perspectives to the minutiae of prison life: survival, coping, soap, teabags, cell mates, the constant noise and immediacy. And needless to say, the men come up with philosophical gems of their own. Her Majesty' Philosophers is also about isolation, the long hours, knockbacks and the emotional mutilation of imprisonment; and whilst philosophy is 'soft and fluffy' it contrasts starkly with the pragmatic world of prison officers, for whom the Holy Grail is Security, Keys and Prison Craft. The book charts how learning changes lives, especially for prisoners who missed out on formal education, who - once motivated - become voracious readers and extraordinary students. It demonstrates more than any official report the value of a wider agenda than Basic Skills. Prisons have been labelled 'Universities of Crime', but colleges are increasingly populated by those who began their studies in a prison cell. In a book packed with wisdom and humour the author laments the fact that prison policy means that this is becoming a far less easy step.

AS SEEN ON BBC BREAKFAST Step inside one of Britain's most renowned prisons... During her time as a prison teacher Mim Skinner met people from all walks of life - what united them, was that they had committed a serious crime. But Mim's job was not to judge them, it was to teach. In this compelling, inspirational memoir Mim takes you behind the bars. From drugs and violence to pregnancy and heartbreak, Mim's classroom saw it all. With high drama but also candid humour The Prison Teacher is full of eye-opening stories of those without a voice, revealing the human side of our country's most controversial institution. 'Shocking, poignant and darkly funny' Woman & Home 'Full of nitty-gritty details of life inside' The Guardian 'Humbling, hopeful and wryly hilarious' The Herald 'Very real and powerful account' Kate Paradine, CEO of Women in Prison 'A humane, sometimes humorous, and always perceptive account of prison life' Ken Loach 'Very funny and important' Pandora Sykes, co-host The High Low Show A STYLIST NON-FICTION BOOK OF YEAR 2020

"Buried Lives" offers the first critical examination of the experience of imprisonment in early America. These interdisciplinary essays investigate several carceral institutions to show how confinement shaped identity, politics, and the social imaginary both in the colonies and in the new nation. The historians and literary scholars included in this volume offer a complement and corrective to conventional understandings of incarceration that privilege the intentions of those in power over the experiences of prisoners.
Considering such varied settings as jails, penitentiaries, almshouses, workhouses, floating prison ships, and plantations, the contributors reconstruct the struggles of people imprisoned in locations from Antigua to Boston. The essays draw upon a rich array of archival sources from the seventeenth century to the eve of the Civil War, including warden logs, petitions, execution sermons, physicians' clinical notes, private letters, newspaper articles, runaway slave advertisements, and legal documents. Through the voices, bodies, and texts of the incarcerated, "Buried Lives" reveals the largely ignored experiences of inmates who contested their subjection to regimes of power.

The only book on Dovegate TC Contains first-hand insider accounts by staff and inmates Describes the latest developments in TC work Provides extensive data and references A closely observed account of the UK's first private sector prison-based Therapeutic Community (TC) - a 200-bed facility. The book considers: the background to and regimes at Dovegate; modern developments in TC work with (often high-risk) offenders; the differences between Dovegate, Grendon and other UK prison-based TCs; private and public sector imperatives; democratic and hierarchical TCs; reparative, restorative and punitive approaches; accreditation, group work, assessment, suitability and de-selection TC-culture versus prison culture the role of positive attitudes, relationships and experiences; psychology, psychiatry, psychotherapy, security and control; how TCs alter behaviour and prevent crime.

Theatre and performance practice has the power to make visible the hidden world of the prison. This book explores how theatre makers stage critical questions about prison in society - through specific texts and productions about prison, and theatre taking place in prisons. Theatre can, it argues, provoke much-needed public engagement with the very idea and politics of prison. Drawing on popular culture, dramatic texts and applied theatre, "Theatre & Prison" examines the link between performance and punishment, and illuminates the social, economic and cultural effects of incarceration.

An uncompromising appraisal of the unique penal crisis affecting Britain and other Western-style democracies. Escalating resort to prisons, longer sentences, overcrowded and ineffective regimes, high rates of re-offending and eclectic penal policy all combine to fuel this crisis, whilst failing to reduce offending. In this new book, David J Cornwell, author of the acclaimed Criminal Punishment and Restorative Justice (ISBN 9781904380207), argues that the symptoms of this penal malaise are grounded in media sensationalism of crime and the need of politicians and their advisers to retain electoral credibility. Change is long overdue, but it requires a fresh, contemporary penology based on Restorative Justice. The book challenges the status quo, asks 'different questions' and places victims of crime at the centre of the criminal justice process. 'The reader is challenged to ask different questions about "true justice" in a book which provides true food for thought in well argued fashion': The Justices' Clerk 'This book offers a sustained argument for restorative justice, and should be heeded by politicians and practitioners alike. Whether either have the courage to take this way of thinking remains to be seen': Internet Law Book Reviews 'David Cornwell seeks to drill down into the key] issues. This book identifies the organizational stresses and strains, the target-setting, the policy "blips" and all the problems of trying to bring radical change to our criminal justice system': Sir Charles Pollard QPM Director, Restorative Solutions, former Chief Constable, Thames Valley Police Service 'An important and timely contribution to the literature': Mark S Umbreit. 'One of the leading writers in the restorative justice] campaign... intelligent and helpful... an urgent call to action particularly about the penal crisis which hangs permanently over this country's head': Justice of the Peace. David Cornwell is a criminologist and former prison governor with extensive experience of operational practice and consultancy within both state and privately managed sectors of correctional administration in a number of countries worldwide. His first book, Criminal Punishment and Restorative Justice, was published by Waterside Press in 2006.

In this autobiographical account of life as a prison governor and administrator, Tom Murtagh deals with life in charge of the Maze Prison, Northern Ireland (when he narrowly avoided being killed by a terrorist bomb) and his move to England that saw him in charge of prisons in Kent and elsewhere. This is when he was faced with a remarkable series of events at Blantyre House where a modern, liberal, ground-breaking and in many respects successful regime was beginning to attract the attention of reformers, academics and others. But that regime also masked more sinister developments - events that should ultimately have received serious attention from a House of Commons Select Committee set up to look into 'The Blantyre House Affair'. Only now - and after much reflection - does Tom Murtagh feel able to tell publicly his side of the affair: of how that committee chose to concentrate on selective and misleading information and 'got it wrong'. Despite all the accolades for Blantyre House, behind the scenes and in reality, the regime was being taken advantage of by a number of very serious offenders who had managed to get themselves transferred there such that the establishment was at risk of being overtaken by organized crime and corruption, leading to covert police and other criminal investigations. The book tells how the author acted to pre-empt this - only to be vilified by HM Inspectorate of Prisons, some penal reform groups and ultimately the committee. As Martin Narey the then Director General of HM Prison Service writes in his foreword, had the author not acted as he did to contain the regime's excesses it is likely that before long Parliament would have been calling for the resignations of Murtagh as Area Director, Narey as Area Director General and also the Home Secretary himself. "The Blantyre House Affair" is a telling example of how people can sometimes be swept along by events that may cause them to ignore those things that are counter or inconvenient to their own aims or interpretation; of how reality can sometimes be ignored.

It is a commonly held assumption that all Victorian prisons were grim, abhorrent places, loathed by their inmates. This is undoubtedly an accurate description of many English prisons in the nineteenth century However, because of the way in which prisons were run, there were two distinct types: convict prisons and local prisons. While convict prisons attempted to reform their inmates, local prisons acted as a deterrent. This meant that standards of accommodation and sanitation were lower than in convict prisons and treatment, particularly in terms of the hard labour prisoners were expected to undertake, was often more severe. Whichever type of prison they were sent to, for many prisoners and convicts from the poorest classes, prison life compared favourably with their own miserable existence at home.

Unhappy Child, troubled adolescent, dissatisfied wife, a woman at odds with convention. This was Elizabeth Fry, known to her family and friends as Betsy. in 1816, at the age of 36, when she had been a minister of the Society of Friends for five years, Betsy walked alone into the hell of Newgate Gaol. The transformation she wrought among it wretched female inhabitants propelled her onto the stage of world history. In the following years she transformed her generation's perception of offenders, and helped create a professional prison service. She was also a catalyst in the long struggle that eventually saw women achieving recognition in the world beyond family and home.

Images of Incarceration focuses on fictional portrayals of prison and prisoners to demonstrate how they are depicted in the cinema and on TV, featuring films such as The Shawshank Redemption, The Birdman of Alcatraz, Scum, McVicar, Brubaker, Cool Hand Luke, Made in Britain and Greenfingers as well as TV dramas like Porridge , Bad Girls , Buried and Oz. The book is part of the Prison Film Project sponsored by the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation under its Rethinking Crime and Punishment initiative. It compares fictional representations with 'actual existing reality' to provide insights into how screen images affect understanding of complex social and penal issues: 'Is prison really as represented on screen, harsher, softer or different?'; 'Do viewers separate fact from fiction?'; and 'What might films tell us about the experiences of prisoners and whether prison reduces crime and protects victims?' As authors David Wilson and Sean O'Sullivan explain, prison may be violent and de-humanising but it makes for gripping drama and human interest. Most people know little about what really happens inside prison, so that as prison numbers in the UK and USA escalate as never before, the 'prison film' and 'TV prison drama' can have a significant influence on popular culture and attitudes towards penal reform. Informative, educational and illuminating, Images of Incarceration will be of value to anyone interested in the effect of screen representations on the democratic process, and in particular to people concerned with criminal justice, penal affairs, penal reform, sociology and the media. Reviews 'Fascinating for anyone who has even a passing interest in penal matters or film': Howard Journal of Criminal Justice Author David Wilson is professor of criminology at the Centre for Criminal Justice Policy and Research at the University of Central England in Birmingham. A former prison governor, he is editor of the Howard Journal and a well-known author, broadcaster and presenter for TV and radio, including for the BBC, C4 and Sky Television. He has written three other books for Waterside Press: The Longest Injustice: The Strange Story of Alex Alexandrowicz (with the latter), Prison(er) Education : Stories of Change and Transformation (with Ann Reuss) (2000), and Serial Killers: Hunting Britons and Their Victims 1960-2006 (2007).

Despite the fact that 160,000 people are locked up in our federal correctional facilities, practical information about the federal prison system remains difficult to locate. While some information may be found scattered on the Internet, in directions given at court, or through shared personal experience, there is no single source available that is a collection of all available information. The U.S. Federal Prison System is the first comprehensive book to include official prison policies, first-person accounts from prisoners, and information about each federal facility. Now published in paperback, The U.S. Federal Prison System is perfect for classroom use as it interweaves the academic study of incarceration with a survey of government reports on prison policy. Organized into two parts, this book is an accessible text on the current U.S. federal prison system. Part I is an introduction to federal prison facilities, including key statistics and "views from the inside" provided by inmates of federal prisons. Part II is a look at the Federal Bureau of Prisons policies on various matters such as discipline, education, visits, and religious practices. Key Features A thorough overview of both prison policies and the federal facilities themselves with photos of selected prisons Part II consistently organizes historical background information followed by an account of current policies-with specific federal rules and regulations governing the policies to conclude each topical discussion Appendix A is the first comprehensive listing of every Federal prison in the U.S., complete with facility details and service information Commentary from prisoners-first-person accounts take the reader behind the walls The U.S. Federal Prison System is an ideal text for students studying corrections and penology in Criminal Justice, Criminology, Law, Social Work, Psychology, and Sociology. This book is also an excellent resource for families of inmates, researchers, and the general public.

"Zinoman makes original contributions on multiple fronts, including colonial systems; prisons as social institutions; political life in prison; public campaigns concerning prisons; and released prisoners in action. He also takes us beyond the colonial/anticolonial, nationalist/communist, and war/peace dichotomies that have long dominated Vietnam studies."--David Marr, author of "Vietnamese Tradition on Trial, 1920-1945"

"This is a wonderful, lucidly argued, and meticulously documented book."--Ann Stoler, author of "Race and the Education of Desire: Foucault's History of Sexuality and the Colonial Order of Things"

A collection of writings by prisoners and other people connected with prisons, from the United Kingdom and beyond, "Prison Writing" is now published annually in book form and continues to promote creative writing among prisoners in the UK and beyond. From 2001, there are prizes for the four best contributions as judged by a panel of experts - in addition to the nominal fees paid to all contributors. Everyone whose work is published receives two complimentary copies of the edition of "Prison Writing" in which it appears. Many prisoners first saw their work in print in "Prison Writing." Some went on to be published in national newspapers and magazines and to attract the interest of book publishers.Interviews continue to be a feature of "Prison Writing." Interviewees have included Eddie Bunker ('"Prison Writing" is doing a real good job. Keep up the good work!'), Martin Amis ('Writing depends on the only thing these guys have plenty of: solitude'), Howard Marks, Hugh Collins and Razor Smith.

IN JUNE 1943, THE CITY OF LOS ANGELES was wrenched by the worst rioting it had seen to that point in the twentieth century. Incited by sensational newspaper stories and public hysteria over allegations of widespread crime among Mexican American juveniles, scores of American servicemen, joined by civilians and even police officers, roamed the streets of the city in search of young Mexican Americans wearing zoot suits -- outlandish suits featuring baggy pants with narrow cuffs and knee-length jackets with wide lapels. Once found, zoot suiters were stripped of their clothes and beaten while police stood by. Only a handful of servicemen were arrested, but over six hundred Mexican American youths were incarcerated for disturbing the peace. The riots threw a harsh light on the deteriorating relationship between the city's Mexican American community and the Los Angeles Police Department.

In this study, Edward J. Escobar examines the history of the LAPD and the Chicano community from the turn of the century, when the police first became a professional organization, to the era of the Zoot Suit riots. Escobar shows how police increasingly characterized Chicanos as a criminal element, and how the assumption of Mexican Americans that the police were deliberately targeting them grew. As Escobar demonstrates, this troubled relationship prompted Mexican Americans to forge a new political identity, even as the LAPD used fear of minority crime to increase its autonomy. This combination of a politicized minority and an intransigent police force would eventually contribute to other uprisings in Los Angeles, including the 1965 Watts riots and the violence that erupted in 1992 following the acquittal ofLAPD officers accused of beating Rodney King.

Making it in Hell, says Bruce Jackson, is the spirit behind the sixty-five work songs gathered in this eloquent dispatch from a brutal era of prison life in the Deep South. Through engagingly documented song arrangements and profiles of their singers, Jackson shows how such pieces as "Hammer Ring," "Ration Blues," "Yellow Gal," and "Jody's Got My Wife and Gone" are like no other folk music forms: they are distinctly African in heritage, diminished in power and meaning outside their prison context, and used exclusively by black convicts.

The songs helped workers through the rigors of cane cutting, logging, and cotton picking. Perhaps most important, they helped resolve the men's hopes and longings and allowed them a subtle outlet for grievances they could never voice when face-to-face with their jailers.

The role of torture in recent Iranian politics is the subject of Ervand Abrahamian's important and disturbing book. Although Iran officially banned torture in the early twentieth century, Abrahamian provides documentation of its use under the Shahs and of the widespread utilization of torture and public confession under the Islamic Republican governments. His study is based on an extensive body of material, including Amnesty International reports, prison literature, and victims' accounts that together give the book a chilling immediacy.
According to human rights organizations, Iran has been at the forefront of countries using systematic physical torture in recent years, especially for political prisoners. Is the government's goal to ensure social discipline? To obtain information? Neither seem likely, because torture is kept secret and victims are brutalized until something other than information is obtained: a public confession and ideological recantation. For the victim, whose honor, reputation, and self-respect are destroyed, the act is a form of suicide.
In Iran a subject's "voluntary confession" reaches a huge audience via television. The accessibility of television and use of videotape have made such confessions a primary propaganda tool, says Abrahamian, and because torture is hidden from the public, the victim's confession appears to be self-motivated, increasing its value to the authorities.
Abrahamian compares Iran's public recantations to campaigns in Maoist China, Stalinist Russia, and the religious inquisitions of early modern Europe, citing the eerie resemblance in format, language, and imagery. Designed to win the hearts and minds of the masses, such public confessions--now enhanced by technology--continue as a means to legitimize those in power and to demonize "the enemy."

This is the history of the foundations of modern carceral institutions in Ontario. Drawing on a wide range of previously unexplored primary material - including the papers of prison inspectors and officials and the correspondence of those who wrote to the authorities - Peter Oliver provides a narrative and interpretative account of the penal system in nineteenth-century Ontario.

In a century of massive social change, the penal system remained rural, local, decentralized, and resistant to transformations that were affecting other areas of society. Despite the efforts of reformers, neither the political elites nor Ontarians in general paid much attention to the inadequacies of a system plagued by neglect, penny-pinching, and the vagaries of local control. In the 1830s, the Kingston penitentiary and punishment by incarceration became the cornerstones of the system, and these elements, however flawed, dominated the Ontario correctional system until the late twentieth century.

'Terror to Evil-Doers' focuses on the purposes and internal management of particular institutions. By synthesizing a wealth of new material into a comprehensive framework, Oliver's seminal study lays the groundwork for future students and scholars of Canadian history, criminology, and sociology.

This text is part of the Readings in Crime and Punishment series, a line of readers covering many aspects of the criminal justice, police, and correctional systems. Incarcerating Criminals look at our prisons and jails, situating them in their social and institutional environments. It will be an ideal text for advanced undergraduate and graduate level courses in criminal justice and criminology, sociology, public policy, and other disciplines looking at our correctional institutions.

This book makes public, for the first time, a full account of the development of the privatization of prisons, centred on the only full-scale empirical study yet to have been undertaken in Britain. After providing an up-to-date overview of the development of private sector involvement in penal practice in the United Kingdom, North America, Europe and Australia, the authors go on to describe the first two years in the life of Wolds Remand Prison - the first private prison in Britain. They look at the daily life for remand prisoners, assess the duties and morale of staff and compare the workings of Wolds to a new local prison in the public sector. The authors conclude by discussing some of the practical and theoretical issues to have emerged from contracting out, ethical issues surrounding the whole privatization debate and implications for the future of the prison system and penal policy.

This unique and original textbook offers undergraduates and interested professionals a much-needed description of how the penal system, including both prisons and alternatives to custody, is organized in eight major Western European countries. Each chapter provides readers with a critical anatomy and empirical overview of the full range of penal sanctions used in each country and an analysis of how these sanctions are implemented. Using statistical data which are not widely available, contributors examine the nature of the penal population in relation to sentencing, to its class, gender and racial composition and to the nature of the offences for which individuals have been confined. While highlighting several common trends in penal policy and strategy across Europe and seeking to assess to what extent these commonalities are being generated by the wider process of political integration, Western European Penal Systems also demonstrates that each of the eight countries has to an important extent its own culture of punishment which is constantly being reinterpreted and reworked.

As new jails fill up almost as soon as they open, conflict continues to grow among public officials, who, in turn, create policies that do little more than avoid blame and temporarily control the crisis. This book proposes that we can understand this crisis by tracing the interdependence of the jail system with local agencies of criminal justice.

With recent sentencing law changes at the state and national level, the United States will continue to use long-term confinement more than any other nation in the world. In this authoritative yet accessible volume, scholars, correctional authorities, researchers, and prisoners examine the use of long- term incarceration as a response to crime, the effects of long- term incarceration, and the strategies used by long-term inmates to adjust to confinement. Long-Term Imprisonment explores the prison experience of both male and female inmates and discusses the correctional management challenges posed by long-term incarceration. The core of this collection, edited by Timothy Flanagan, is a set of articles first published in The Prison Journal, the official journal of the Pennsylvania Prison Society and the oldest journal in the field of corrections. These articles are complemented with research reports on the effects of long-term confinement, a comprehensive analysis of long-term inmates currently confined in American and Canadian prisons, and essays written by long-term prisoners. If you are interested in the use and operation of prisons, and in the impact of these institutions on the people confined within them, this book is for you. In addition to students studying imprisonment, the book informs correctional administrators and policymakers about the nature of long-term inmate population and the impact of long-term imprisonment. "Timothy Flanagan began studying the effects of long-term incarceration over two decades ago when he conducted one of the first major studies of prisoners serving long sentences. Since then, many changes have occurred in corrections and sentences practices that have greatly increased sentence lengths and the number of prisoners serving long sentences. The collection of the essays contained in Long-Term Imprisonment represents the most comprehensive, up-to-date, and definitive review of literature regarding the effects of long-term incarceration on prisoners. Flanagan provides readers with a variety of perspectives of long- term imprisonment by including articles written by prison researchers, corrections officials, and long-term prisoners. This book is must reading for anyone interested in life in prisons and the unique world of the long-term prisoner." --Kevin N. Wright, Binghamton University

The pervasiveness of surveillance, punishment, and control within and outside of spaces such as jails, prisons, and detention centres suggests that the carceral is becoming an increasingly prevalent presence in our lives, going beyond historical standards. The contemporary use of electronic monitoring extends carceral territory beyond prison walls, into people's homes and everyday lives. Empirically and empathetically driven, Portable Prisons is a telling exploration of the electronic monitoring of offenders based on an ethnographic case study from Scotland. Electronic monitoring must be understood - in both intent and effect - as a carceral practice, an expression of the carceral state and its overreaching punitive capabilities. James Gacek demonstrates that various people experience punishment by means of restrictions around mobility, space, and time in ways that strongly overlap with the reported experiences of interviewed prisoners. Drawing attention to how the neoliberal state outsources the labour of punishment to private corporations and the punished themselves, he also rejects the idea that "soft" punishment is in any way related to the movement for decarceration. Offering an original contribution to our understanding of the geography of incarceration, Portable Prisons is a sophisticated account of electronic monitoring, underlining the growing significance of this field.