Women Prisoners and Women Penal Officials 1840–1921

Datos Bibliográficos

ID8401030
AutoresBill Forsythe (University of Exeter, autor de correspondencia)
Año1993
Volumen33
Número4
Páginas525-540
Fecha de publicación1993-01-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaThe British Journal of Criminology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0007-0955 • E-ISSN: 1464-3529
EditorialOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/oxfordjournals.bjc.a048357
OpenAlexW2343687357
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas9

This article is about three aspects of prison discipline relating to women between 1840 and 1921. Firstly, important arguments advanced by Dobash, Dobash, and Gutteridge (1986) and Zedner (1991) are discussed. I suggest that Dobash et al. were mistaken in their view that women were more intensively punished for prison indiscipline than men in order more effectively to condition them to stereotyped gender roles. Zedner's notion of a distinctive female ethos in the early Victorian prison system is also appraised and I argue that the characteristics described by Zedner were also present with regard to male prison discipline. Secondly, I discuss testimony of some women prisoners to illustrate their perception of imprisonment and of their lives more generally. Lastly, I argue that the Home Office and Prison Commission systematically discriminated against women officials and that outside pressure groups were a key factor in securing senior appointments for women

Commission · Criminology · Ethos · Imprisonment · Perception · Political science · Prison · Sociology · Historical Economic and Social Studies · Historical Psychiatry and Medical Practices · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · Law · Psychology