Coretta Phillips - The Multicultural Prison: Ethnicity, Masculinity, and Social Relations among Prisoners

THE MULTICULTURAL PRISON

CLARENDON STUDIES IN CRIMINOLOGY

Published under the auspices of the Institute of Criminology,
University of Cambridge; the Mannheim Centre, London School
of Economics; and the Centre for Criminological Research,
University of Oxford.

General Editor: Lucia Zedner
(University of Oxford)

EDITORS: MANUEL EISNER, ALISON LIEBLING, AND PER-OLOF WIKSTRM
(University of Cambridge)

ROBERT REINER, JILL PEAY, AND TIM NEWBURN
(London School of Economics)

IAN LOADER AND JULIAN ROBERTS
(University of Oxford)

RECENT TITLES IN THIS SERIES:
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Tough Choices: Risk, Security, and the Criminalization of Drug Policy
Seddon, Williams, and Ralphs

Discovery of Hidden Crime: Self-Report Delinquency Surveys in Criminal Policy Context
Kivivuori

Serious Offenders: A Historical Study of Habitual Criminals
Godfrey, Cox, and Farrall

Penal Abolitionism
Ruggiero

Ethnicity, Masculinity, and Social
Relations among Prisoners

CORETTA PHILLIPS

Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP,
United Kingdom

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Coretta Phillips, 2012

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Clarendon Studies in Criminology aims to provide a forum for outstanding empirical and theoretical work in all aspects of criminology and criminal justice, broadly understood. The Editors welcome submissions from established scholars, as well as excellent PhD work. The Series was inaugurated in 1994, with Roger Hood as its first General Editor, following discussions between Oxford University Press and three criminology centres. It is edited under the auspices of these three centres: the Cambridge Institute of Criminology, the Mannheim Centre for Criminology at the London School of Economics, and the Centre for Criminology at the University of Oxford. Each supplies members of the Editorial Board and, in turn, the Series General Editor.

The Multicultural Prison revisits the theoretical models developed in classic writings on the sociology of prisons in the USA in the light of major changes in the life of the prison and transformations in racial politics. It opens with a fascinating analysis that draws together the influence of globalization, migration, and racial politics on the political economy of modern punishment. It then builds on the best traditions of prison ethnography to address the daily negotiation of race, culture, and masculinity in prison. The Multicultural Prison answers challenging questions about the interior life of the prison. Its major contribution is to explore and expose the racial and political dynamics of prison life.

A fine, disarmingly honest, and highly revealing methodological chapterwhich should be compulsory reading for all those contemplating doing research in prisonsprecedes three chapters that describe and analyse the resulting data. These explore the internal dynamics of prisoner society and address, in particular, the role of racial identities in social relations within prison. The findings derive from detailed observation and extended interviews with prisoners in two selected prisons undertaken by Coretta Phillips and researcher Rod Earle. The material presented in these chapters is rich, informative, and thought-provoking. It throws new light on prisoner identity, faith, and cultural practices, on inmate relations within prison, on the exercise of power, and the ways in which inmates evolve adaptive strategies. In so doing it makes a substantial contribution to our understanding of inmates experiences of prison life and the ways in which ethnicity, culture, religion, and masculinity inform and affect inmates interactions with one another and their ability to cope with the pains of imprisonment. The ever present menaces of violence and racism, vividly evidenced in the interview material and researcher observations, paints an upsetting picture of social relations that stands in tension with the vibrant multiculturalism, which is also shown to be a feature of prison life.

Coretta Phillips has a well-established and well-deserved reputation for her work in the field. She has published widely, especially in the field of ethnicity, race, and criminal justice. In addition to her extensive research and publications, she has long experience working within the Home Office as a researcher. She has also acted as consultant to the United Nations, the Home Office, Her Majestys Prison Service, and as a member of the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) Independent Equalities Advisory Group. Her first-hand knowledge and practical experience combines with an evident talent for ethnography that has resulted in a sensitive and genuinely illuminating analysis.

This welcome addition to the Clarendon Studies in Criminology Series fills a significant gap in ethnographic studies of prison life and, as such, it is an important contribution to criminological knowledge. It will be of interest to criminology, law, and social policy students at undergraduate and postgraduate level, to prisons scholars and to those working within the prison service or on issues of race and ethnicity in the criminal justice system more generally.

The Editors welcome this new addition to the Series, not least because it exemplifies the ambitious mix of theoretical and empirical work for which the Series was originally founded.

Lucia Zedner
University of Oxford
September 2012