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Chapter 2

Chapter 2. The American Prison in Historical Perspective: Race, Gender, and Adjustment. Penitentiaries. Women and minorities have been ignored in most historical descriptions of prisons. Minorities have always been overrepresented. First American penitentiary: Walnut Street Jail (1790)

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Chapter 2

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  1. Chapter 2 The American Prison in Historical Perspective: Race, Gender, and Adjustment

  2. Penitentiaries • Women and minorities have been ignored in most historical descriptions of prisons. • Minorities have always been overrepresented. • First American penitentiary: Walnut Street Jail (1790) • Jacksonian era (1820-1830): penitentiary emerged in numbers • Two systems – separate & congregate

  3. Two Systems (1 of 2) • The Separate System • Walnut Street Jail • Also called Philadelphia or Pennsylvania system • solitary confinement, isolated labor • aim – penance, change of character

  4. Two Systems(2 of 2) • The Congregate System • Auburn prison • slept in solitary cells, worked, ate and exercised together • harsh punishment • aim – penance, change of character • became the model for American prisons largely because it was less expensive • Europe adopted the separate system (arguably because it did not need labor)

  5. Women and Minorities in the Penitentiary • Women and minorities not subjected to ideas of penitentiary: that penance could induce change • Warehoused • Women often in attics • Not even counts of number of African-Americans

  6. The Reformatory Era (Late 1800s) • Elmira first reformatory • Men – military model; women – family model • Women’s reformatories (1860-1935) – young, less serious offenders • Plantation prisons (in south) • White women were seldom incarcerated • Black women worked in kitchen gardens • Men were leased out

  7. The Big House (Early 1900s) • No programs, hard labor, plantation prisons in South • Advances • Introduction of tobacco, abolishment of corporal punishment, internal freedom of movement • Racially segregated, overrepresentation of minorities • Women’s custodial prisons were in a wing or part of men’s prisons

  8. The Correctional Institution • Emerged in 1940s and 1950s • Less brutal punishments, more privileges, boredom prevailed • Correctional institutions rarely “corrected”

  9. Contemporary Prisons • Race is defining element. • Violence has risen and now is declining. • Women’s prisons are evolving to become more custodial.

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