PWG - Revisiting ‘the pains of imprisonment’

Session Submission Type: Pre-arranged Panel

Abstract

Sykes’s concept of the ‘pains of imprisonment’ has had an unparalleled influence on prison sociology. The aim of this panel is to revisit this concept, and way it has shaped understandings of imprisonment, from a number of angles. Collectively, the papers that comprise the panel question whether these pains remain relevant to contemporary prisons, whether their impact takes the form that Sykes suggested, whether the concept of ‘pain’ requires further elaboration, and whether (and in what ways) prison studies should look beyond the prison itself to better understand the problems and hardships that people experience while within it and on release.

Subtopic

• Topic 5: Social Control and Criminal Justice / Imprisonment, Prisons, Prison Life and Effects of Imprisonment (Prisons WG)

Chair

• Ben Crewe, University of Cambridge

Individual Presentations

• Revisiting Sykes’ pains of imprisonment in the 21st century: Insights from incarcerated individuals in Canada - Bucerius Sandra, University of Alberta; Kevin Haggerty, University of Alberta

• Pains, problems and the texture of imprisonment: Building on the emprical and theoretical contributions of The Society of Captives - Ben Crewe, University of Cambridge

• Zatopekian pains of imprisonment - Thomas Ugelvik, University of Oslo

• Women's Incarceration in Germany: Social control in and beyond the prison - Anna Schliehe, Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg