Doctoral Dissertation Research: Investigating the Meaning and Experience of Motherhood in Correctional Facilities

主要研究者：Naomi Gerstel和Brittnie L. Aiello调查的意义和经验的母亲在惩教设施0718018摘要本研究探讨的含义，母亲在惩罚和控制的监禁妇女。 以往的研究表明，母亲身份是妇女获得意义和自我价值的重要资源，但也限制和约束了妇女的生活。 对于被监禁的妇女来说，与母亲有关的快乐和悲伤被惩罚和监禁的条件夸大了。 本研究在已有研究的基础上，运用多种方法考察了监狱中母性的社会建构。通过民族志，访谈，和检查的案例记录，本研究研究的方式，母性的建设是用来惩罚，控制和奖励女囚犯，正式的，通过制度化的惩罚制度和非正式的，通过互动，基于其种族和阶级地位的妇女的陈规定型观念的假设，和操纵妇女的内疚与母性。为了进一步探讨母性的复杂性，本研究还深入探讨了女性通过母性的抵抗。在多大程度上，母亲身份赋予了妇女在监禁中生存的力量，并以积极的方式定义自己，尽管机构和社会的信息与此相反？这项研究集中在母性的性别惩罚的研究，并给出了一个声音的人口很大程度上隐藏在美国人的意识。有关被监禁妇女的具体问题的政策往往含糊不清，不统一。母性在妇女生活中的首要地位、在整个社会中利用母性作为社会控制手段以及现有的性别惩罚做法都强烈表明，母性在对妇女的刑事惩罚中起作用。然而，我们对制约被监禁妇女与其子女之间关系的社会进程知之甚少。这项工作将试图建立可检验的假设，对广泛的社会科学观众和政策驱动的立法机构和刑事司法系统说话的被监禁的母亲。

Primary Investigators: Naomi Gerstel and Brittnie L. AielloInvestigating the Meaning and Experience of Motherhood in Correctional Facilities0718018AbstractThis research examines the implication of motherhood in the punishment and control of incarcerated women. Previous research has documented that motherhood is an important resource for meaning and self-worth for women, but also limits and constrains the lives of women. For incarcerated women, the joy and sadness associated with motherhood are exaggerated by the conditions of punishment and confinement. Building on existing research, this research uses multiple methods to investigate the social construction of motherhood in jail. Through ethnography, interviews, and examination of case records, this research studies the ways that constructions of motherhood are used to punish, control, and reward women inmates, both formally, through institutionalized systems of punishment and informally, through interaction, stereotypical assumptions about women based on their race and class status, and the manipulation of women's guilt associated with motherhood. To further explore the complexities of motherhood, this research also delves into women's resistance through motherhood. To what extent does motherhood give women the strength to survive their incarceration and define themselves in positive ways in spite of institutional and societal messages to the contrary? This research centralizes motherhood in the study of gendered punishment and gives a voice to a population largely hidden from the American consciousness. Policies governing concerns that are specific to incarcerated women are often ambiguous and non-uniform. The primacy of motherhood in women's lives, the use of motherhood as social control in society at-large, and existing practices of gendered punishment strongly suggest that motherhood is at work in the criminal punishment of women. Yet, we know little about the social processes that govern relationships between incarcerated women and their children. This work will attempt to establish testable hypotheses about incarcerated motherhood that speak to a wide social science audience and a policy-driven legislature and criminal justice system.