The author(s) shown below used Federal funds provided by the U.S. Department of Justice and prepared the following final report: Document Title: Under the Penal Gaze: An Empirical Examination of Penal Consciousness Among Prison Inmates Author: Lori Sexton Document No.: 239671 Date Received: September 2012 Award Number: 2010-IJ-CX-0002 This report has not been published by the U.S. Department of Justice. To provide better customer service, NCJRS has made this Federally- funded grant final report available electronically in addition to traditional paper copies. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. Under the Penal Gaze: An Empirical Examination of Penal Consciousness Among Prison Inmates Final Report Submitted to the National Institute of Justice Award #2010-IJ-CX-0002 Lori Sexton Department of Criminology, Law and Society University of California, Irvine June 26, 2012 This project was supported by Grant No. 2010-IJ-CX-0002 awarded by the National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. Findings and conclusions of the research reported here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, IRVINE Under the Penal Gaze: An Empirical Examination of Penal Consciousness Among Prison Inmates DISSERTATION submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in Criminology, Law and Society by Lori Sexton Dissertation Committee: Professor Valerie Jenness, Chair Professor Mona Lynch Professor Carroll Seron 2012 This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. © 2012 Lori Sexton This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................................ v LIST OF TABLES ......................................................................................................................... vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................................................... vii CURRICULUM VITAE ................................................................................................................. x ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION .................................................................................... xiii Chapter 1. Introduction, Literature Review and Methodology ....................................................... 1 Literature Review ........................................................................................................................ 4 Macro-Level Assessments of Penal Harshness ....................................................................... 4 Linking the Theoretical and the Empirical: Micro-level Descriptions of Punishment ........... 9 Tension between Carceral Macrostructure and Micro-Level Institutional Context ............. 19 Direct Supervision: The Influence of Micro-Level Context and a Potential Exception to Overall Harshness ................................................................................................................. 20 From the Lived Experience of Punishment to the Construction of Penality ........................ 23 Methodological Approach ........................................................................................................ 28 Research Sites and Sampling ................................................................................................ 28 Collecting In-Person Interview Data .................................................................................... 34 Method of Analysis ............................................................................................................... 38 Overview of Dissertation .......................................................................................................... 39 Chapter 2. Penal Subjectivities ..................................................................................................... 42 Findings .................................................................................................................................... 42 Content of Punishment and Level of Abstraction ................................................................. 42 Severity of Punishment ......................................................................................................... 56 Salience of Punishment ......................................................................................................... 64 The Punishment Gap ............................................................................................................. 70 ii This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. Discussion and Conclusion ....................................................................................................... 79 Chapter 3. Narratives of Penal Consciousness ............................................................................. 81 Findings .................................................................................................................................... 82 Penal Consciousness as Relation to Life and Death ............................................................. 82 Punishment as Part of Life .................................................................................................... 84 Punishment as a Separate Life .............................................................................................. 94 Punishment as Suspension of Life ...................................................................................... 100 Punishment as Death ........................................................................................................... 106 Discussion and Conclusion ..................................................................................................... 111 Chapter 4. Situating Penal Consciousness .................................................................................. 115 Findings .................................................................................................................................. 116 Comparison of Penal Consciousness by Supervision Style ................................................ 116 Comparison of Penal Consciousness by Gender ................................................................ 136 Discussion and Conclusion ..................................................................................................... 160 Chapter 5. Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 165 Overview of the Penal Consciousness Theoretical Framework ............................................. 165 Content of Punishment and Level of Abstraction ............................................................... 165 Assessing Salience and Severity of Punishment ................................................................. 166 Narratives of Penal Consciousness ..................................................................................... 167 Variations in Penal Consciousness by Supervision Style and Gender ............................... 169 Implications of the Penal Consciousness Theoretical Framework ......................................... 171 Implications for the Empirical Study of Punishment .......................................................... 171 Theoretical Implications of a Broader Conceptualization of Penality ................................ 173 Policy Implications for a Loosely Coupled System ............................................................ 176 Directions for Future Research ............................................................................................... 178 iii This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department