Compassionate Confinement

by Abrams, Laura S.; Anderson-nathe, Ben

• ISBN13: 9780813554129
• ISBN10: 0813554128
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2013-02-01
• Publisher: Rutgers Univ Pr

Summary

To date, knowledge of the everyday world of the juvenile correction institution has been extremely sparse. Compassionate Confinementbrings to light the challenges and complexities inherent in the U.S. system of juvenile corrections. Building on over a year of field work at a boys' residential facility, Laura S. Abrams and Ben Anderson-Nathe provide a context for contemporary institutions and highlight some of the system's most troubling tensions. This ethnographic text utilizes narratives, observations, and case examples to illustrate the strain between treatment and correctional paradigms and the mixed messages regarding gender identity and masculinity that the youths are expected to navigate. Within this context, the authors use the boys' stories to show various and unexpected pathways toward behavior change. While some residents clearly seized opportunities for self-transformation, others manipulated their way toward release, and faced substantial challenges when they returned home. Compassionate Confinementconcludes with recommendations for rehabilitating this notoriously troubled system in light of the experiences of its most vulnerable stakeholders

Table of Contents

Foreword

Acknowledgments

Introduction

History and Current Tensions in Juvenile Corrections

The Setting

Mixed Messages: "Therapy Speak" in a Correctional Milieu

"Take It Like a Man": Masculinities, Treatment, and Crime

"Jumping through Hoops": Identity, Self-Preservation, and Change

On the Outs

Rehabilitating Rehabilitation: What We Learned from Unit C

Appendix

References

Index

Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.