Prison Case Study

IN WHAT WAYS DO RACE, CLASS AND GENDER SHAPE PRACTICES AND EXPERIENCES IN PRISON? DRAW ON THEORIES AND EXAMPLES/CASE STUDIES TO SUPPORT YOUR CASE.

Introduction

To punish someone, in criminology, is to intentionally condemn the breaking of criminal law through penal regulation (Hudson 2002). From the death penalty at one end of the spectrum, to fines at the other end, punishment is synonymous with prisons. It is often the most desired form of justice but it is also the most contradictory form of punishment. This contradiction can be examined when exploring race, class and gender within prisons. Scholars have explored the history of the prisons by reviewing the rises and falls of prison numbers and tracing the changing purpose of prisons throughout

By this, we refer to situations where prisoners are given differential treatment as a result of the same behaviour. A key factor that influences a prison staff’s discretion is the long held negative stereotypes. Crenshaw did not adequately explain the reason why this is so, but we argue that it is, as many Indigenous scholars do, that the ultimate source of oppression is ‘colonialism’. When Australia was being colonised, Aboriginal people were essentially treated as lesser human beings; subjected to massacres, children were taken away, women were raped, and there was a total disregard for Aboriginal culture and religion. Colonialism has had negative consequences for the natives of a nation, which result in the domination of Indigenous people. In one instance of a strip search on an Aboriginal woman, police officers laughed after she completed her strip search and was made to stand naked (ABC News 2011). Statistics shows that Aboriginal women are six times more likely to be sexually abused compared to non-Aboriginal women (Sunday Morning Herald 2013) and exacerbates an Aboriginal women’s experience in prison. Furthermore, this reiterates the degradation of the whole procedure and emphasises white domination over Aboriginal