Prison Masculinities

by Sabo, Donald F.; Kupers, Terry A.; London, Willie

• ISBN13: 9781566398169
• ISBN10: 1566398169
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-01-19
• Publisher: Temple Univ Pr

Summary

This book explores the frightening ways our prisons mirror the worst aspects of society-wide gender relations. It is part of the growing research on men and masculinities. The collection is unusual in that it combines contributions from activists, academics, and prisoners.The opening section, which features an essay by Angela Davis, focuses on the historical roots of the prison system, cultural practices surrounding gender and punishment, and the current expansion of corrections into the "prison-industrial complex."The next section examines the dominant or subservient roles that men play in prison and the connections between this hierarchy and male violence. Another section looks at the spectrum of intimate relationships behind bars, from rape to friendship, and another at physical and mental health.The last section is about efforts to reform prisons and prison masculinities, including support groups for men. It features an essay about prospects for post-release success in the community written by a man who, after doing time in Soledad and San Quentin, went on to get a doctorate in counseling.The contributions from prisoners include an essay on enforced celibacy by Mumia Abu-Jamal, as well as fiction and poetry on prison health policy, violence, and intimacy. The creative contributions were selected from the more than 200 submissions received from prisoners. Author note: Don Sabo, Professor of Social Sciences at D'Youville College in Buffalo, is author or editor of five books, most recently, with David Gordon, Men's Health and Illness: Gender, Power, and the Body and, with Michael Messner, Sex, Violence, and Power in Sports: Rethinking Masculinity. Sabo has appeared on The Today Show, Oprah, and Donahue.Terry A. Kupers, M.D., a psychiatrist, teaches at the Wright Institute in Berkeley. He is the author of four books, editor of a fifth. His latest books are Prison Madness: The Mental Health Crisis Behind Bars and What We Must Do About It and Revisioning Men's Lives: Gender, Intimacy, and Power. Kupers has served as an expert witness in more than a dozen cases on conditions of confinement and mental health services.Willie London, a published poet, is General Editor of the prison publication Elite Expressions. He is currently an inmate at Eastern Corrections. For nine years he was a prisoner at Attica.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	xi
Part I: Introduction	1	(18)
Gender and the Politics of Punishment	3	(16)
Don Sabo
Terry A. Kupers
Willie London
Part II: Historical Roots and Contemporary Trends	19	(40)
Penitence for the Privileged: Manhood, Race, and Penitentiaries in Early America	21	(14)
Mark E. Kann
Race, Gender, and Prison History: From the Convict Lease System to the Supermax Prison	35	(11)
Angela Y. Davis
Crime, Politics, and Community Since the 1990s	46	(8)
Marc Mauer
The Elements of Crime	54	(2)
Anthony Thomas
A World Without Softness	56	(1)
Willie London
Slave Ship	57	(2)
Steve Fraley
Part III: The Social Construction of Prison Masculinities	59	(50)
Doing Time, Doing Masculinity: Sports and Prison	61	(6)
Don Sabo
Masculinities, Crime, and Prison	67	(6)
James W. Messerschmidt
Grappling with Issues of Privilege: A Male Prison Worker's Perspective	73	(5)
David Denborough
The Culture of Transgression: Initiations Into the Homosociality of a Midwestern State Prison	78	(15)
Carl Bryan Holmberg
Male Prisoners: Privacy, Suffering, and the Legal Construction of Masculinity	93	(10)
Nancy Levit
Boyz II Men	103	(1)
Horace Bell
Devil's Den	104	(1)
Horace Bell
My Mother Death	105	(1)
Willie London
Prison Friendships	106	(3)
Derrick Corley
Part IV: Sexualities, Sexual Violence, and Intimacy in Prison	109	(46)
Rape and the Prison Code	111	(7)
Terry A. Kupers
A Million Jockers, Punks, and Queens	118	(15)
Stephen ``Donny'' Donaldson
The Story of a Black Punk
Anonymous	127	(6)
The Wall of Silence: Prison Rape and Feminist Politics	133	(4)
Susanne V. Paczensky
A Moment	137	(2)
O'Neil Stough
Caged and Celibate	139	(4)
Mumia Abu-Jamal
The Phone	143	(2)
Michael Keck
Be Not so Quick to Judge	145	(3)
Alice
Reflections	148	(2)
Carlos Hornsby
Skin Blind	150	(3)
Dan Pens
Once More I Dream	153	(2)
Stephen Wayne Anderson
Part V: Men's Health in Prison	155	(46)
Preventive Health Strategies for Men in Prison	157	(16)
Will H. Courtenay
Don Sabo
Sentence---Death by Lethal Infection: IV-Drug Use and Infectious Disease Transmission in North American Prisons	173	(11)
Carol Polych
Don Sabo
Deliberate Indifference	184	(8)
O'Neil Stough
Mental Health in Men's Prisons	192	(6)
Terry A. Kupers
Night Crier	198	(3)
Rudy Chato Paul Sr.
Part VI: Prison Reform, Reforming Prison Masculinities	201	(64)
Scars	203	(4)
Jarvis Masters
Boys are not Men: Notes on Working with Adolescent Males in Juvenile Detention	207	(11)
Jackson Katz
Support Groups for Men in Prison: The Fellowship of the King of Hearts	218	(6)
Harris Breiman
T. Pete Bonner
The Anti-Exploits of Men Against Sexism, 1977-78	224	(6)
Daniel Burton-Rose
Men Helping Men: Facilitating Therapy Groups for Sex Offenders	230	(9)
Charles J. Sabatino
Litigation, Advocacy, and Self-Respect	239	(8)
Donald Specter
Terry A. Kupers
Rehabilitating Prison Labor: The Uses of Imprisoned Masculinity	247	(8)
Christian Parenti
Reentry: Prospects for Postrelease Success	255	(10)
Lige Dailey Jr.
For Further Reading	265	(4)
About the Contributors	269	(4)
Index	273