Overview
- Offers a rare insight into death and dying in prison based on empirical data
- Draws on the author's previous experience as a prison chaplain for 9 years
- Discusses research ethics
Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Prisons and Penology (PSIPP)
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About this book
This book uses empirical data gathered using ethnographic methods in two contrasting prisons to provide a rare insight into death and dying in prisons in the UK. The majority of deaths in prison custody in England and Wales result from natural causes, yet the experiences of people dying in prison and the impact of these deaths on the wider prison are under-researched areas. It provides a novel insight into the impact of deaths from natural causes on the prison as an institution and challenges existing work juxtaposing occupational philosophies of ‘care’ and ‘control’. It also identifies how end of life care is provided in prisons and the impact this has on culture and relationships shows how deaths from natural causes in prison custody ‘soften’ prison regimes, culture and relationships. It speaks to an international audience by drawing on the global literature including from the US.
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Keywords
Table of contents (8 chapters)
Reviews
“Essential reading for all studying prisons, working in prisons, or creating policies on prisons! This beautifully written book provides us with a brilliant, powerful, ethical and compassionate critique of prison regimes and cultures as well as a more caring way forward, based on ethnographic observations and interviews with incarcerated men and prison staff.”
— Professor Maggie O‘Neill, Department of Sociology and Criminology, University College Cork; Visiting Professor, Northumbria University, UK
“This fascinating, timely, and elegantly written book provides an unrivalled insight into an under-explored but increasingly frequent phenomenon, namely the deaths of prisoners from natural causes. Robinson provides an evocative, penetrating and deeply attentive analysis of the complex moral, spatial and practical questions surrounding the care of dying prisoners, revealing how prisoners and prison staff grapple with mortality and grief in places where notions of humanityand care are contested and unevenly practiced. Dying in Prison is essential reading for anyone with a serious interest in what happens within prisons and the realities of dying in circumstances and settings few would choose for their final days and hours.”
—Dr Kate Gooch, Department of Social and Policy Sciences, University of Bath, UK
Authors and Affiliations
About the author
Carol Robinson is a lecturer in Criminology at the University of York, UK, where she teaches at undergraduate and postgraduate level. She previously worked as a prison chaplain.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Dying in Prison
Book Subtitle: Deaths from Natural Causes in Prison Culture, Regimes and Relationships
Authors: Carol Robinson
Series Title: Palgrave Studies in Prisons and Penology
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-27103-8
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Cham
eBook Packages: Law and Criminology, Law and Criminology (R0)
Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-031-27102-1Published: 11 May 2023
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-031-27105-2Published: 11 May 2024
eBook ISBN: 978-3-031-27103-8Published: 10 May 2023
Series ISSN: 2753-0604
Series E-ISSN: 2753-0612
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XI, 236
Number of Illustrations: 1 b/w illustrations
Topics: Prison and Punishment, Human Rights, Sociology of Family, Youth and Aging, Palliative Medicine, Medicine/Public Health, general, Research Methods in Criminology