NCJ Number
229372
Date Published
2009
Length
20 pages
Annotation
This chapter describes narratives of change and resistance for women prisoners participating in a prison drug treatment program (the therapeutic community).
Abstract
The encounter within the therapeutic community (TC) can be characterized as a mirror that women hold up to their own experience as a way to examine both their own individual behavior and those of their sisters in the program. The TC provides a context for women to use the encounters not only to show 'responsible concern' for others, but also to reflect on their past pain and current needs. These narratives of change show the promise of treatment and the way women see their own pathways to and from prison. These observations illustrate that forms of resistance and accommodations shape the reality of the TC. The TC model asks women to discuss their past behaviors and experiences in the encounter as a way to discard old versions of self and create and sustain new definitions and new futures. These narrative accounts presented in this chapter are derived from descriptions drawn from participant observation and interviews over 16 months in an in-prison TC. It is suggested that the world of the TC and its effect on its women participants fit closely the model presented by the symbolic interaction perspective, which argues that the self is created through an ongoing process of interaction between one individual and others and the looking glass concept. In the TC, the expectation is that women will see their own problems and subsequent solutions by looking through the eyes of another's experience. Notes and references