Innocence as burden and resource: Adaptation and resistance during wrongful imprisonment

Drawing on theoretical scholarship on adaptation and resistance in prisons, I explore the significance and function of innocence—and the acute sense of non-belonging it triggers in the prison setting—in wrongfully-convicted men's responses to imprisonment. Using in-depth interviews with 15 exon...

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Autor principal: Umamaheswar, Janani (Autor)
Tipo de documento: Electrónico Artículo
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: 2023
En: Theoretical criminology
Año: 2023, Volumen: 27, Número: 3, Páginas: 499-516
Acceso en línea: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
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Sumario:Drawing on theoretical scholarship on adaptation and resistance in prisons, I explore the significance and function of innocence—and the acute sense of non-belonging it triggers in the prison setting—in wrongfully-convicted men's responses to imprisonment. Using in-depth interviews with 15 exonerated men in the United States, I argue that innocence functioned as a double-edged sword for the men as they adapted to their wrongful imprisonment: Innocence represented a social and psychological burden as men adjusted to prison life, but it simultaneously facilitated their resistance to formal and informal penal control. Through a discussion of how the men leveraged their innocence to distance themselves psychologically, socially, and symbolically from the prison world, I highlight how, despite being victims of egregious injustice, wrongfully-convicted men are also agentic resistors of the penal system.
ISSN:1461-7439
DOI:10.1177/13624806221112167