Full Description
Imprisonment has become big business in the United States. Using a "history of ideas" approach, this book examines the cultural underpinnings of prisons in the United States and explores how shared ideas about imprisonment evolve into a complex, loosely connected nationwide system of prisons that keeps enough persons to populate a small nation behind bars, razor wire and electrified fences.
Tracing both the history of the prison and the very idea of imprisonment in the United States, this book provides students with a critical overview of American prisons and considers their past, their present and directions for the future. Topics covered include:
• a history of imprisonment in America from 1600 to the present day;
• the twentieth-century prison building binge;
• the relationship between U.S. prisons and the private sector;
• a critical account of capital punishment;
• less-visible prison minorities, including women, children and the elderly; and
• sex, violence and disease in prison.
This comprehensive book is essential reading for advanced courses on corrections and correctional management and offers a compelling and provocative analysis of the realities of American penal culture from past to present. It is perfect reading for students of criminal justice, corrections, penology and the sociology of punishment.
Contents
1. Introduction
2. A Brief History of Imprisonment in America (1600-1900)
3. The Twentieth Century Prison Building Binge
4. Federal Prisons in The Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries
5. Profiting from Punishment: Corporations and American Prisons
6. The Final Solution - Capital Punishment
7. Less Visible Prison Minorities - Women, Children and the Elderly
8. Prison By-Products - Violence and Disease
9. The Future of Prisons in The United States
References
Index
