Abstract
Expressions of masculinity in prison are most often characterized as being structured in response to an environment that encourages displays of stoicism, bravery, physical prowess and violence/aggression. However, we found that the antagonistic, precarious and risk-prone environment of the prison shapes prisoners’ behaviours and the constitution of ‘normative’ and hegemonic masculinities in more nuanced ways than prior research suggests. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 56 male parolees, we explored how these men perceived and responded to risk while incarcerated, as well as how prison masculinities are linked with experiences and management of risk to their personal (legal, physical and emotional) safety. In this article, we focus on how prisoners mobilized and negotiated their masculine subjectivities to handle the uncertainty of imprisonment and the various risks they encountered in prison. We argue that penal risks and prison masculinities are mutually constitutive; risk is linked to perceptions of physical and emotional vulnerability, which shape prisoners’ masculine embodiment. Simultaneously, prisoners try to respond to uncertainty and perceived risk in ways that present their masculinity as empowered rather than submissive. Our findings advance the conceptualization of prison and hegemonic masculinities, penal environments and risk/uncertainty.
Prison masculinities, are normally structured by a hierarchy of penal subcultures and situated within a framework that exaggerates those understandings of ‘traditional male socialization’ which stress conventional masculine ideals, such as bravery, strength, and being ‘stand-up’ (e.g. staying true to one’s word or repaying debts) (Haney, 2011; Phillips, 2001; Ricciardelli, 2013; Rymhs, 2012; Toch, 1998). These hierarchical structures of penal subculture are defined largely by criminal history and offences. For example, sex offences (especially those involving children) are stigmatized, while offences related to organized crime and armed robbery are normatively framed as ‘manly’ and associated with status (Hsu-Fu, 2005; Ricciardelli, 2014). This framing of the prison environment assumes a set of prescriptive norms that, while salient, need to be situated in context and studied more closely to determine if and how these masculine forms are internalized, adjusted and performed, as well as how they coexist with (and may be diminished by) alternative expressions of masculinity and contexts. In this article, we argue that masculinities are more fluid and transient than traditional accounts suggest (Connell, 1995; Messerschmidt, 2012), because penal spaces are also disempowering and often purposefully emasculating environments where men are detached from traditional masculine associations including freedom, agency, autonomy and heterosexuality (Bandyopadhyay, 2006). To this end, we disentangle hegemonic masculinities from the masculine prison environment and its social hierarchy to reveal nuanced variations of gender in particular, we reveal how hegemonic masculinity(ies) in prison are evidenced in the successful defeat by select prisoners of diverse vulnerabilities: he who appears the least physically, emotionally and legally vulnerable and is best able to manage the uncertainty of prison life holds the most empowered position in relation to other prisoners.
The penal context
In custodial environments, prisoners mobilize a range of masculinities ‘to ensure emotional, psychological and social survival, employing strategies to mask self-perceived weakness or vulnerability and to attain status and legitimacy’ (De Viggiani, 2012: 271). By labelling specific forms of masculinity as ‘hegemonic’ scholars have conflated the processes by which certain forms of masculinity dominate a social context with the processes by which these masculine forms are reciprocally connected to a range of understudied marginalized or ‘subordinate’ (e.g. non-hegemonic) masculinities—despite the recognition that prisoners encounter persistent risk of victimization and/or exploitation (Denborough, 1995; Gear, 2007). Masculinities that are habitually equated with feminized characteristics (e.g. empathy, caring, parenting, emotional/physical fragility) are seldom considered in prison research. Instead, scholars tend to focus on how penal environments encourage excessive violence and aggression, thereby validating a form of predatory masculine identity wherein some men are prey and others predators (Lutze and Murphy, 1999; Nandi, 2002; Toch, 1998). This omission ‘[obscures] the academic engendering of gender knowledges’ (Messerschmidt, 2012: 72).
Largely absent from prison research on hegemonic masculinities is a nuanced understanding of how masculinities interact with each other, connect to how prisoners understand risk and produce context-specific risk management strategies. More specifically, scholars have yet to explore how hegemonic masculinities interact with ‘feminine’ feelings of risk, uncertainty, and vulnerability (i.e. concepts often culturally read as feminine) and how feeling ‘at risk’ conflicts with, and reshapes, ideals typically considered to be manly (e.g. stoicism, competitiveness, courage, brazenness, physical prowess and strength). Equally, most research about risk in prison has overlooked how prisoners’ variable interpretations of and responses to risk and ‘penal uncertainties’ are gendered and how these reflect, challenge and produce gender norms (Hannah-Moffat and O’Malley, 2007). Here ‘penal uncertainties’ refer to features of prison life that are difficult to predict (e.g. arbitrariness of decision making, cell placement, involuntary transfers to different prisons, ranges or cells) and the unique effects of human agency, which require different managerial strategies. In short, within the context of imprisonment, little is known about how risk and uncertainty shape gender, are gendered, and how agency may affect these processes. A comprehensive analysis of the gendered nature of imprisonment must explore how hegemonic masculinity is affected by prisoners’ perceptions of risk and their calculated efforts to produce safety and govern uncertainties of prison life, as well as how these are framed by the penal structure and experiences of vulnerability.
To address these research gaps, and recognizing that prisoners’ reactions to and strategies for managing and avoiding gendered risks have important (and understudied) effects in the production of gendered penal hierarchies, hegemonic masculinities and prison masculinities, we explore how formerly incarcerated men talked about their masculinity and experiences of risk in prison. We examine the empirical and conceptual nuances of their gender identity, including how overcoming vulnerabilities underlies the constitution of hegemonic masculinity, and how this complexity relates to the well-documented but overstated and exaggerated ‘masculine environment’ of men’s prisons. We argue that prison masculinities are temporal, malleable and partially contingent on local prison environments. We also explore how gendered understandings and responses to risk and penal uncertainty affect prison masculinities, and how these multifaceted factors may apply to a broader relational analysis of hegemonic masculinity and gender in prison. We do this by documenting how prison masculinities are formed in relation to prisoners’ fluid characterizations of risk or ‘vulnerabilities’ (physical and emotional), and how vulnerability and uncertainty can simultaneously reproduce and destabilize masculine ideals that are, in any social context, often unachievable. We demonstrate that the standard emphasis on hegemonic masculinity in the male prison can obscure the presence of other coexisting forms of masculinities, which further structure, empower and produce the artifice of gendered positioning. Here, risk and masculinity are framed as mutually constitutive. In this study we explore how prisoners calculate risks and manage penal uncertainty by using their experienced judgement, shrewd guesswork and rules of thumb (O’Malley, 2004). Our analysis will contribute to the general literature on masculinities, especially risk and prison masculinities.
Hegemonic masculinities
The concept of hegemonic masculinity has been theorized in various ways and continues to be the subject of much debate (see Connell, 1987, 2002; Connell and Messerschmidt, 2005; Hall, 2002; Jefferson, 2002, Messerschmidt, 2012). For the purposes of this article, we build on and extend the definition used by Connell (Carrigan et al., 1985; Connell, 1995) and later Connell and Messerschmidt (2005), who focused on the power differentials involved in the hierarchical systems of gender relations. According to this definition, hegemonic masculinity is constructed in relation to, and occupies a position of superiority over, femininities and all other masculinities (see also Connell, 2002), legitimizing the hierarchical structure of gender relations by ensuring that subordinate masculinities are positioned at the bottom of the gender hierarchy (see also Messerschmidt, 2012 on dominant and dominating masculinities).
Masculinity cannot be reduced to a single simplistic form: masculinities are complex, versatile social constructions with many variations and subtypes—and relational and legitimizing aspects of the concept are both important (see Jefferson, 2002). Hegemonic masculinity is thus fluid and temporal, intrinsically unstable in its embodiment and constitution and always changing into new and often more powerful forms (Connell, 1995). In their later work, Connell and Messerschmidt (2005) emphasized that hegemonic masculinities plural are constructed at the local, regional and global level, where they manifest and develop in various ways. According to Hall (2002: 37), Connell’s introduction of the ‘threatened male’ into the discourse allows the totalizing image of the transhistorically oppressive male to be juxtaposed against its vulnerable alter ego. He builds on this tension by claiming that a diversity of ‘subordinate’ masculinities shadows the traditional oppressive norm, offering men alternative gendered identities that can contest this norm in progressive ways.
The malleability of hegemonic masculinity reinforces its authority and new ideals emerge as men successfully respond to environmental or relational risks and vulnerabilities—resulting in novel standards of dominance that other men must try to meet.
Constituting prison masculinities
Research about gender in prison has documented the hierarchical relationships between incarcerated men (Evans and Wallace, 2008; Jewkes, 2005), showing how deprivation, the restrictive nature of prison and the ‘pains of imprisonment’ shape prison masculinities (Bosworth and Carrabine, 2001; Goffman, 1961b; Sykes, 1958), or how masculinities are learned and imported from the street into the penitentiary (Irwin and Cressey, 1962; Jewkes, 2005). Recent scholarship has integrated various aspects of masculinities, including the effects of importation as well as deprivation (Lahm, 2008, 2009; Sparks et al., 1996), how prison experiences affect behaviour and presentation post-release and how prison and post-prison regimes overlap in shaping lives inside and outside the prison. Prison scholars have conceptualized how hegemonic masculinity is constituted in prison in various ways (e.g. Bandyopadhyay, 2006; Hsu-Fu, 2005; Jewkes, 2005; Ricciardelli, 2013; Whitehead, 2005), and Messerschmidt’s (2001: 71) claim that ‘inmates construct varieties of masculinity through specific social interaction inside the prison milieu’ illustrates how context is vital to configurations of, and theories about, masculinities.
In general, scholars perpetuate the idea that hegemonic masculinity in prison develops within an excessively aggressive context that reinforces an authoritative, controlling, heterosexual, independent and violent kind of masculinity, consistent with the ‘cultural ideal of manhood’ within prisons (Haney, 2011: 131). This form of masculinity may be caused by the disempowering and emasculating penal environment where men are detached from hegemonic and traditional masculine associations including freedom, agency, autonomy and heterosexuality. Essentially, imprisonment destabilizes the ideal of ‘manliness’ and acts as a ‘civil death’ (Bandyopadhyay, 2006; Goffman, 1961a, 1961b). For example, male prisoners may struggle with their embodied masculinity because they cannot sustain their roles of breadwinner and protector while incarcerated (Bandyopadhyay, 2006), nor can they assert their masculinity via displays of overt heterosexuality (Ricciardelli, 2013), so they require ways to affirm their masculinity (see Hall, 2002). In this sense, men face unique challenges as they try to construct their sense of self (Connell, 1995).
As imprisoned men try to find ways to affirm their gender and sexuality, 1 many use their bodies, through sport (Sabo, 2001) or bodybuilding (Nandi, 2002). Regardless of ethnicity, muscularity, physical prowess and ability are valued signifiers of power, dominance and manliness among prisoners (e.g. Nandi, 2002; Phillips, 2001). Even prisoners with precarious self-esteem have been found to engage in displays of excessive masculinity to amplify their status and self-worth while simultaneously minimizing their risk of victimization at the hands of another prisoner (Toch, 1998). Within this penal context, how gender is constituted reflects these situational and relational realities. However, framings of prison masculinities have focused so intently on the hyper-masculine aspects of prison that they have understated the efforts of prisoners to manage the uncertainties of penal living. In turn, prisoners’ strategies of dealing with penal uncertainties produce observable expressions of excessive masculinity and the appearance of hyper-masculine prisons.
In her work on ‘doing gender’ Miller (2002: 437) stressed the need to eliminate circular reasoning in understanding gender (e.g. resorting to the view of behaviour as being governed by structure), specifically the need to recognize the ‘transformative potential of agency’. She focused on the multiple masculinities (and femininities) that are shaped by structural positioning, recognizing that routinized behaviours can constitute normative aspects of gendered action that then can affect understandings of power and inequality—or how gender is ‘done’. Expanding on her work, and focusing on risk and prison masculinities at the local (institutional) level, we argue that masculinity as a cultural ideal is central to conceptions of vulnerabilities/risk and the associated processes of gender constitution used to negate perceived ‘weakness’. These vulnerabilities help reveal the spatial and temporal qualities of masculinities because masculinities are inseparable from social context and culture (Connell and Messerschmidt, 2005). Prison masculinities are spatially and temporally formed in relation to penal uncertainties, contextual norms and social practices in prisons, that is, ‘an embodied enactment of “being a man” in different settings’ (Robinson and Hockey, 2011: 8).
Penal risks: Gendered perceptions of risk/vulnerability
Most research about risk in the penal context has focused on the quantitative risk assessment instruments used to manage the risk posed by offenders to the public (Feeley and Simon, 1992). Few scholars have explored how prisoners, individually and/or collectively, construct and manage risk and uncertainties, despite being aware that fear and risk are inherent aspects of penal living and ‘arguably the overriding feature of life in most institutions’ (Jewkes, 2005: 46). Some have investigated issues related to safety in prison, but most have focused on documenting prisoners’ experiences of victimization or violence. Wolff and Shi measured prisoners’ feelings of safety based on self-reported experiences of victimization. They found that although some prisoners felt comparatively safe during incarceration, others felt vulnerable due to the widespread aggression and violence in prison, and that ‘feeling unsafe […] [was] strongly and positively associated with their actual experiences of victimization’ (Wolff and Shi, 2009: 803). Researchers working to inform policies to increase prisoner safety have also tried to identify which prisoners are most vulnerable to victimization (e.g. older prisoners), and the spatial components of fear and victimization (Hunt et al., 1993; Kerbs and Jolley, 2007; Wolff and Shi, 2011). These studies generally rely on prisoners’ self-reported experiences of mental, physical and sexual victimization, rather than on prisoners’ broader perceptions, assessments and strategies of managing risk to their personal safety.
In contrast, analyses of the gendered nature of risk in prison, and how male prisoners navigate uncertainty, help reveal how forms of risk and masculinity interact in prison. Studies of risk beyond punishment have shown that risk, like gender, is subjective, and that perceptions of risk are contingent upon social context: what is considered ‘risky’ depends on an individual’s position in society, and changes with time and location (Hannah-Moffat and O’Malley, 2007; O’Malley, 2004). For example, Sanders (2004) studied occupational risk among British street sex workers and found that sex workers consciously assess and manage occupational risks through calculated strategies that are informed by their own and others’ perceptions and experiences of risk, which she described as dynamic, interactive and relational. Risk-informed behaviours are increasingly being conceptualized as the outcome of ‘negotiated actions’ (Rhodes, 1997: 218). Some masculinity and risk scholars (Linneman, 2000; Race, 2007) have explored how various gay masculinities form relative to risk, and how risk is integral to the production of a gendered identity. In other words, there are gendered differences in preferences for risk taking and kinds of risk-taking activities as well as in exposure to risks of different kinds (whether chosen or not) […] and techniques to deal with, risks. As this suggests, the gender–risk nexus is capable of considerable complexity and variability. (Hannah-Moffat and O’Malley, 2007: 6; see also Lyng and Matthews, 2007)
Our research shows this ‘gender–risk nexus’ also appears within the context of penal risks and prison masculinities shaping how prisoners acquire their knowledge and strategies for negotiating and managing the risks they encounter. Gendered forms of risk and risk management organize the lives of individuals in ways that make them responsible for avoiding criminal victimization (Stanko, 1997; Walklate, 1997). Studies of gendered risk in the penal context, although largely focused on women, have revealed how particular ‘gendered understandings of risk produce new responsibilities and patterns of action, as well as new strategies for the definition, control and neutralisation of risk’ (Hannah-Moffat and O’Malley, 2007: 2; see also Turnbull and Hannah-Moffat, 2009). However, few scholars have focused on gendered issues such as what is perceived as ‘risk’ or ‘risky’ and why, as well as what informs these gendered perceptions, 2 even though individuals are widely expected to recognize, and then appropriately and effectively manage, their own risks (e.g. to their health, at work, in relationships; see Hannah-Moffat and O’Mally, 2007) and the uncertainty of imprisonment. Therefore, we explored perceptions and experiences of risk among prisoners by analysing their narratives and how these connect and affect their understandings of masculinity.
Methods
We conducted semi-structured open-ended interviews with 56 men, with active or recently expired warrants, who had previously been incarcerated in at least one of the 11 Canadian federal men’s prisons 3 in Ontario. Participants were recruited by word-of-mouth by employees of a day-reporting centre in the community. They were never directly asked or pressured to participate, and only those who volunteered were included in the study (i.e. parole officers had no role in recruitment, so participation could not be traced or affect their community supervision). Interviews were conducted between February 2011 and February 2012. Although a semi-structured interview guide was accessible during interviews, it was put aside once a participant started to discuss his experiences openly. This approach gave participants the opportunity to speak freely about their prison experience, and the interviewer the flexibility to explore emergent conversational paths. To reveal how participants perceived and understood masculinity and risk, we asked participants about their more general understandings and experiences of masculinities, rather than about specific forms of risk (e.g. physical or sexual victimization). For example, we asked whether they felt vulnerable in prison, what they felt threatened by, and how they negotiated these feelings of risk.
After each interview, we asked participants 4 to complete a demographic survey outlining their criminal and incarceration history. Interviewees had been sentenced to prison terms ranging from two years to life with parole, and ages ranged from 19 to 58 years (M = 37). Most (75 per cent, n = 42) had served a previous sentence in a provincial facility and/or a youth correctional facility (43 percent, n = 24). A total of 17 (30 per cent) men had served more than one federal sentence, and 12 (21 per cent) had been paroled (or had qualified for statutory release) from their first experience of incarceration. The number of sentences served did not appear to influence the results, as no discernible differences were observed between respondents in this regard. Many (80 per cent, n = 45) interviewees had served time in at least one minimum-security penitentiary, more than half (55 per cent, n = 31) in at least one medium-security penitentiary and less than half (36 per cent, n = 20) in at least one maximum-security prison. 5 Convictions included second-degree murder, drug-related offences, sexual offences and white-collar crimes.
Each interview took place in a private space at the day-reporting centre between February 2011 and March 2012; interviews were voice-recorded and 45–180 minutes in length. The audio files were transcribed verbatim 6 and coded according to emergent themes using a grounded theory approach (Glaser and Strauss, 1967). This was followed by selective coding, after we had reached consensus about all emergent themes. We chose to interview men who had been released from prison for a number of reasons: this ensured participants could talk freely about their experiences of risk without fearing any repercussions for participating or disclosing sensitive information, and also allowed them to reflect on their entire experience and the process of incarceration, including how their understanding of risk changed over time in prison. However, because they discussed their prison experiences retrospectively, recalling memories may have been challenging for some, and their reintegration experiences may have influenced their perceptions about life in prison.
Risk and masculinities
Prison masculinities are constituted in tandem with and through a range of gendered vulnerabilities (and the strategies imprisoned men deploy to manage risk). All 56 of our interviewees reported experiencing ‘risk’ while imprisoned. They made indirect or direct references to how distinct forms of vulnerability affected their understandings of risk, which consequently shaped masculinities within prison. The next sections focus on their accounts of physical and emotional vulnerability.
Physical vulnerability
The majority of respondents reported feeling at risk of physical violence from other prisoners throughout their incarceration. Although victimization scholars largely evade locating men and masculinities in the, often helpless and vulnerable, victim position due to the dichotomous construction of perpetrator versus victims (Braithwaite and Daly, 1994), our interviewees reported various forms of risk, ranging from minor acts of physical aggression (pushing) to extensive and even lethal acts of violence (stabbing). Our data revealed that violent encounters among prisoners tended to be more pronounced in higher-security prisons than in lower-security prisons. Specifically, interviewees referred to a pervasive risk of violence in the maximum-security facilities they were housed in before being classified and transferred to their ‘home institution’, and/or while they served out their sentence. The unpredictability of these facilities heightened tensions, and the persistent risk of physical harm emphasized their physical vulnerability and made them feel continually ‘on edge’. Some respondents reported feeling uncomfortable even in their own cell because they shared it with potentially ‘tougher’, ‘stronger’ and ‘more dangerous’ cellmates. One said: And the first day I got there [to this prison] they approached me and told me I was too big so they’d have to stab me from behind. So, I sharpened up my shank [a homemade knife]. And I went to shower with my shank; the shower, washroom, gym, yard. I ate with my shank, I had my shank all the time. I never felt safe; stressed all day. Looking behind me, I was always having my back to the wall; always watched my surroundings.
This excerpt destabilizes the idea that fears of victimization are gendered (culturally read as feminine) and links the omnipresent risk of violence to prisoners’ temperaments and erratic behaviours: ‘I may have been in a good mood yesterday, but you don’t know what I have been through today, so the same joke you said yesterday, [today] I punch you in the face.’ The inherent uncertainty required prisoners to be pro-active in ensuring their own safety. Interviewees reported needing to act ‘tough’ and ‘prove themselves’ to be accorded respect and status and to avoid being targeted by other prisoners: ‘You’re stuck in a zoo. Gotta be an animal! That’s exactly what it is.’ The need to ‘prove themselves’ and perform as dependable, invincible and intimidating was at the core of their prison experience. Although it is difficult to calculate precisely the risks within these contexts, these examples demonstrate how prisoners use their experience and instincts to manage potential risks and uncertainty through specific displays of masculinity.
In the maximum-security environment, excessive ‘macho’ displays of strength and toughness were widespread and thus constituted the normative masculinity. This kind of gendered strategy allowed prisoners to mitigate vulnerability and demonstrate power, and thereby potentially create new vulnerabilities that other prisoners would need to manage to maintain their own status and social position. Thus, presentations of masculinity as a strategy to minimize physical risk by other prisoners also worked to sustain and reproduce perceived physical risk among prisoners, supporting the hyper-masculine prison culture. Prisoners who exhibited the most physical prowess and aggression and appeared most impenetrable in positioning were viewed as having effectively managed their vulnerabilities—the hegemonic ideal—and in doing so created risks for others to negotiate.
Many respondents mentioned feeling deprived or disconnected from family, friends, sexual relations, material possessions and autonomy. They had to obey the ‘commands’ of correctional officers and sometimes other prisoners, and lacked control over who they had contact with inside or outside of prison, or with whom they shared a cell. This lack of power created vulnerability because unforeseen events could always occur: ‘sometimes something stupid you do, and instead of them saying “hey, don’t do that”, the way they know it is to just beat you up’. This excerpt illustrates the perceived omnipresent risk of violence and how unpredictability and lack of control contribute to the subordinating, even emasculating, and ominous experience of incarceration. Few studies have documented how this masculinity co-exists with and reinforces ideals of prowess, making some prisoners appear invulnerable and others vulnerable, and how risk is constituted through performative processes of achieving and affirming masculinity. The prisoner considered most invulnerable to unpredictability and risk in the penal environment is perceived as having negotiated these challenges; this perception reinforces and restructures the complexities of deprivation and its associated vulnerabilities for all other prisoners. In the process, what constitutes hegemonic masculinity, that which is most revered and respected among prisoners, is also reconfigured and reasserted.
The unpredictability and volatility of maximum-security penal contexts shapes a prisoner’s sense of physical safety and security on man made clear; ‘People do fight, and people do have shanks and you hear about stuff. Even when I was in jail, two people died.’ Faced with the constant fear of physical harm, prisoners embody decidedly aggressive masculine personas while also feeling frightened, weak and exposed. Another said, ‘Well, you could just feel the stillness of; just the stillness that anything could happen.’ This sense of ‘stillness’ illustrates the unspoken tension within prison—physical violence is not perceived as a temporary situational risk, but as a certainty: You may not want to fight this guy; then there are guys in your ears saying: ‘You can’t take this because then everyone will think you’re this’ or ‘You’ve got to do this or else you can’t walk with us!’ No, you need these guys to be walking with [you] in case anything happens or what are you going to do?
These men, then, perform masculinity in light of perceived physical risk and this risk simultaneously shapes their masculinity by motivating an ultra-masculine self-presentation. As further demonstrated in the above excerpt, interviewees said they were more inclined to use physical force when they were insulted, publicly challenged or pressured to act forcefully by other prisoners, and that physical force was a strategy of masking fear (informed by risk) by performing masculinity (to negate risk). One said, With all the other guys who were watching the altercation they wanted me to hurt him and I didn’t [but I showed them I could], I put him in a head lock where he couldn’t breathe for about a minute and then I let him go.
Prisoners would exaggerate their physical prowess to mask their vulnerability and represent themselves as in control—they ‘man up’.
Using physical violence to manage vulnerability/risk also reproduced the masculine ideals of assertiveness, power and toughness within the prison environment. Interviewees reported acting ‘tough’ and violent, but knew such acts could have consequences: ‘it was like if I fight him I’ll get smashed probably. And if I get smashed, I’m going to [be transferred] and [will] look like an idiot, because I got beat up and I got sent back.’ Being transferred to a more secure prison for many prisoners meant reduced freedom and indicated personal failure or even unmanliness to their peers (i.e. getting ‘beat up’ and caught by staff), and therefore involved the risk of new vulnerabilities. As a result, they adjusted their behaviour based on their perceptions of risks (i.e. adopting or abandoning assertive and aggressive masculine behaviours). These shifts occurred in a variety of prison contexts, and tended to vary by the prison’s security classification. Even in higher-security prisons, where a strong and tough masculinity is prominently displayed, prisoners did not always or automatically consider violence and aggression to be effective risk-management strategies. For example, in more secure prisons, many prisoners immerse themselves in organized activities such as body-building (see Ricciardelli, 2013) to help overcome boredom, alleviate tension and feelings of isolation, and limit their physical vulnerability by spending time away from other prisoners or in supervised settings. Interviewees also referred to acting passively or stoically and avoiding attention. Many said they chose to embody a softer masculinity, demonstrating that even within the volatile masculine environment of the maximum-security prison, prisoners may adopt strategies that could be culturally read as traditionally masculine and others that could be read as feminine (e.g. being passive or compliant) in an effort to deal with perceived risk.
Other strategies that prisoners employed to manage penal uncertainties created new risks. For example, asking for help from prison staff could involve the risk of looking like a ‘snitch’ to other prisoners and increase the likelihood of physical victimization. Many respondents referred to how their behaviour could unknowingly produce conflict, especially those who had never been in federal custody before and were unfamiliar with the informal norms of penal cultures. One interviewee explained that during his first federal sentence a group of prisoners approached him: They said it’s because of you that our friend went to the hole … I’m eating in private [and] he punches me and blood [is] all over. When he punched me he made [a] hole in my lip and when I drink water the water comes from here. He’s threatening me; they [the officers] told me ‘We can’t protect you.’
This excerpt illustrates how learning the ‘rules’ was vital for prisoners dealing with overwhelming feelings of uncertainty and unpredictability, because violence is often used to enforce or maintain dominant power relations. Another man described how he sometimes felt the need to adopt a hyper-masculine persona: Even though I knew that my beef was bad, they’re still some harmful guys in there. I still had to make sure that I wasn’t stepped on … although I’m cut—in general, I’m not a big guy, so I had to still be careful and make sure that people don’t think they can just walk all over me. There were numerous times I had to confront guys; hoping that a physical confrontation wouldn’t go down. But I’ve noticed, in prison, you have to step up your game … I’ve had to continue on with that sort of the manipulation, the survival skill of somewhat acting a little more tough than I am.
This kind of strategic use or avoidance of violence through the deployment of various masculinities illustrates the gendered complexities of risk, the dynamics of the penal context and how agency, cultural norms and structure interact to produce hegemonic masculinity and penal hierarchies.
Many respondents downplayed the extent and forms of risk they experienced. One said, ‘most times they [other prisoners] will just be playing games’. However, in the next breath, they often described the actual extent of the danger and how they mitigated the possibility of being harmed. Many aspects of daily living placed prisoners in comprising situations that needed to be pre-emptively and strategically managed: Did I feel safe? Yeah and no. Safe because I know I could handle myself, not safe because there’s times, like if you’re sleeping and you wanna sleep, [but] people are under rage or whatever, someone else could get your door buzzed, run up on you.
This excerpt illustrates how basic human needs can be impaired by a lack of physical safety, and how prisoners may use strategies such as being aware of the surroundings and being prepared for altercations to reduce perceived vulnerabilities. Consequently, to avoid victimization and assert ‘manliness’, prisoners needed to self-present as strong in body and mind, and as having some semblance of control within an uncertain environment—a largely impossible feat that cannot be mastered through rational calculation.
Prisoner-to-prisoner interactions play a vital role in perceptions of safety and order. Prisoners have tenuous social positions, and their sense of safety is contingent on the presence (or absence) of other prisoners. Some respondents said their sense of risk was exacerbated by constant changes in the composition of the prison population, ranges and cellmates. Prison environments are transient because the composition of prison population shifts with transfers, sentence completions and other administrative decisions. This fluidity means that safety is continuously being altered. New prisoners can jeopardize a prisoner’s social position and destroy any sense of security and comfort. This uncertainty in terms of prisoner populations is accompanied by considerable emotional (and physical) risk because prisoners must constantly reassert their masculinity—one man said he could never ‘get comfortable’. When asked about the overall experience in prison, another respondent said: I was fortunate to be with some good guys so that was like home. And then … the good guys left, and I had three or four more months left. That three or four more months was [a] problem, different fights, arguments with guys …
These non-threatening ‘good guys’ offered this respondent a sense of safety and comfort, allowing him to relax and lower his guard. The introduction of new prisoners on the range required him to prepare for the possibility of new physical challenges and unknown risks, rekindling the feeling of ‘anything can happen’ that he had temporarily been able to suspend.
Gendered subjectivities in prison are informed by stratified and hierarchal structures, with a gendered component that is illustrated by the ability of prisoners to occupy multiple masculine subject positions simultaneously. Although hierarchies shape many prison cultures, prisoners use their gendered subjectivities to mediate this context, strategically and fluidly adopting a diverse range of masculinities and gendered risk strategies to navigate a variety of situations and relationships. This re-evaluation of self-presentation and risk management strategies is exemplified by changes in prisoner behaviours during the transition from maximum to minimum security. One respondent said that after he was placed in a less-secure prison that housed prisoners convicted of sexual offences as well as ‘solid’ offenders, he knew he could not ‘speak his mind’ about his disdain towards sex offenders if he wanted to remain in the less-secure institution or to ‘get parole’. He acted more submissively towards prisoners, particularly sex offenders, who he considered inferior persons, to minimize the risk of transfer to a higher-security prison. This suppression of feelings shows how imprisoned men strategically adopt different masculinities to respond to ever-changing risks. Masculine subjectivities shift with prisoners’ perceptions of risk, which differ according to context-specific vulnerabilities that are shaped by the penal structure and context-specific relationships that prisoners must negotiate to survive.
Although many respondents reported acting tough, particularly in higher-security institutions, they recognized that this was a precarious status that could be destabilized by other ‘stronger’ prisoners’ displays of toughness. Thus, to counter such acts of aggression, interviewees also presented gendered strategies of avoiding conflict—they tried to be tough, but not too tough: Yeah, you have to be that person you don’t want to be. Like going around with your head down all the time and at the same time you don’t want to be that guy always [be]cause somebody’s going to come check you. You can’t be the baddest guy; there’s always someone badder than you.
Thus, prisoners often strategize about their self-representation and actively align their conduct with displays of masculinity that elicit respect, and in doing so protect their sense of self and emotional well-being. Not surprisingly, many interviewees characterized this negotiation of masculinity as a ‘balancing act’ where the appearance of calmness and passivity are paired with strategic displays of prowess and physicality. Overall, gendered experiences of physical vulnerability take different forms in prison, as do the strategies used to manage vulnerability. Yet, in all cases, physical vulnerability appears to be closely associated with feelings of insecurity, powerlessness and a lack of control, and these feelings reinforce expressions of aggressive and stoic masculinities.
The precariousness of the penal environment means that safety is temporary, and continuously produced and renegotiated as environmental conditions, dynamics and relationships change. Inability to secure physical safety magnifies emotional vulnerability; it creates nervousness, worries and even anxieties. Thus, physical and emotional vulnerability are closely interrelated and reinforce each other, and the prison environment must be continuously managed through a range of gendered strategies. By learning how to present themselves in line with more revered forms of prison masculinity, imprisoned men could manage, and sometimes reduce, their exposure to risk. Vulnerability is inescapable in prison; prisoners are not able to let down their guard, relax and secure a space devoid of risk. The management of these risks requires men to be flexible, where he who appears least vulnerable emerges as hegemonic within the specific context.
Emotional vulnerability
Participants referred to various forms of emotional vulnerability, part of an affective repertoire of everyday life in prison (see Crewe et al., 2014). Emotional vulnerability is also related to pre-prison, prison, and post-prison experiences and ethos, specifically how prisoners adjust and redefine their masculine self in relation to other prisoners, staff and the outside world. When men enter prison, they are alienated from their previous roles, including family, careers and ties to the community, and their prior identities including breadwinners, partners, fathers, protectors (see Bandyopadhyay, 2006). They are faced with the complex task of adapting to a new context, and this process is often associated with feelings of insecurity, uncertainty and emotional exposure.
Many interviewees mentioned being estranged from their families, and wanting to be reunited with family and friends as quickly as possible, ‘I can’t wait to … see my family; I love and miss them so much.’ While in prison, they were apprehensive that reunification could be delayed or unsuccessful, and were worried and uncertain about their post-prison future. Also, because they had abandoned their pre-prison roles, they were concerned about family separation, social isolation and reunification, all of which were intensified by institutional structures. Some respondents specifically referred to how official regulations and procedures affected their emotional well-being and mental health. In maximum-security facilities, prisoners are locked in their cells up to 23 hours each day. One man described his extreme loneliness and boredom as he grappled with the loss of freedom: It’s very hard … It’s lock-up, lock-up, lock-up all the time. You’re alone in a room. You just come out 15 minutes to have a shower every other day, use the phone. And then back into the cell again. It’s no free time.
The lack of free time, and the extreme social isolation, can create apprehension. Many men admitted to having anxiety, sometimes diagnosed at clinical levels. Some said that while in their locked cells, they would anticipate and plan, often in minute-by-minute increments, how they would spend their time outside their cell (e.g. shower, phone or yard). Some said their unease would intensify as their ‘out of cell’ time approached (this was never consistent or guaranteed and was always prone to cancellation due to lock-down or staff shortage). This lack of autonomy produced an unnerving emotional vulnerability that conflicted with norms of the penal environment that preclude expressions of emotional ‘weakness’.
For some respondents, family members and friends on the outside were the only form of emotional support and relief from the loneliness and social isolation experienced in prison: I was just alone, the only thing I had that got me through it was my mom, if it wasn’t for her I probably wouldn’t have made it. […] Having someone to call at bedtime, I didn’t have anybody else in 10 years I never had one visit. […] And like I said if it wasn’t for my mom I don’t think I could have made it.
This kind of emotional dependence contradicts the expectation that men deal with loneliness and other emotional ‘weaknesses’ on their own. Evans and Wallace (2008: 486) wrote that: dominant forms and codes of masculinity can serve to legitimize violence, both toward others and the self, as a means of dealing with emotional pain, while talking about difficult feelings or asking for help would only lead to a loss of masculine power.
Nonetheless, our findings suggest that competing masculinities are used in prison, and are strategically employed depending on context. Many of our participants did not suppress or conceal feelings of emotional attachment and pain caused by separation as a way of avoiding a ‘soft’ and emotionally frail appearance. Some said they felt comfortable confiding in other prisoners who shared similar experiences and could offer some empathy. According to one, ‘you have so much in common with other people, you can relate, and you have girl problems on the outside and you can talk to one another about this and that’. Considerable research has focused on the effects of family separation on women prisoners (particularly separation from children), and how social relationships among women prisoners may help cope with emotional pain, but few studies have explored similar issues in men’s prisons. Because most analyses of prison masculinities and hegemonic masculinity tend to focus on the ‘ultra-masculine’, they often overlook this kind of ‘softer’ facet of masculinity.
Clearly, the forced separation from loved ones and uncertainty about when or even if they will be reunited or able to maintain these relationships in prison, combined with the need to adopt a new prisoner identity, challenged our respondents’ sense of self and well-being and affected their self-presentations in prison. One said that he had to ‘fight literally for five years to hold on to who I was, all the while adapting to an environment and my surroundings. I had to survive.’ This example shows how a prisoner’s emotional vulnerability is twofold, stemming from anxieties related to unpredictability and insecurity, and also from his changing subject position as he acclimatizes to the prison community. The latter may also involve the fear of losing his identity or self. Competing strategies in the quest for self and safety are gendered, in that a prisoner can no longer maintain a position of the ‘dominant male’ in the family and is forced into a stereotypically ‘feminine’ state of anxiety and concern about his relationships, being accepted back into his old role, and losing or finding himself. This heightened state of anxiety exemplifies a fear that is not as widely acknowledged as women’s concerns for familial obligations and maternal responsibility, and is antithetical to the forms of masculinity typically associated with prison culture. Moreover, even though prisoners are emotionally vulnerable, they still need to maintain a tough, aggressive, and strong demeanour to acquire status and mitigate harm. Many found it distressing to ‘man up’ or to act violently, describing it as emotionally taxing and also as creating identity challenges as they had to decide what was acceptable or unacceptable for others and themselves—two often conflicting realities.
Some interviewees referred to more severe emotional distress, noting that their mental health and emotional ‘weaknesses’ were sometimes connected with experiences of physical vulnerability. Men were able to show a softer side in prison yet the revelation of actual frailty or a perpetual state of frailty was too much and equated to vulnerability. Some, even those who had served time in less-restrictive environments, admitted to having suicidal thoughts, ideations or attempts, and a few even displayed their self-inflicted wrist wounds. One described being unable to cope and therefore self-injuring after being placed in segregation and being denied support by the prison’s psychiatrist, despite his deteriorating mental health and active requests for help: Apparently I was down there for five days before I saw a psychiatrist, now I’m totally out of it, I’m not the same. I go up and I tell the Psychiatrist what’s on my mind; tell him how I’m feeling. He looks me straight in the face and says ‘You’re a liar.’ He says, ‘Go upstairs to the population, you will be fine.’ So he sent me up. I went up to, I think it was, the second floor they put me on that night. I slit my wrists.
This excerpt reveals this man’s emotional fragility and his reliance on staff for help. Inflicting pain on oneself or ‘internalizing’ fear and worry are in opposition to traditional male socialization, which teaches men to stifle their emotions or ‘externalize’ them via violence, sports or other kinds of aggressive behaviour (Adler and Adler, 2011). Self-injury is viewed as signifying a man’s inability to regulate and cope with his emotions. This example is salient in prison environments where men must demonstrate their physical and mental strength to minimize harm but the practice of self-injuring leaves scars that expose such inabilities and can lead to tangible often isolating (e.g. the self-injurer may be removed from the general population and put in segregation and/or on suicide watch) consequences. Nonetheless, men do self-injure, inside and outside prison (Adler and Adler, 2011), in an attempt to overcome anxiety and emotional pain. The discourse surrounding self-injury is largely feminized, and within the prison culture, mental or emotional fragility and the ways men deal with these ‘weaknesses’ play a relatively minor role in explaining the constitution of prison masculinities and the forms of masculinity that serve to reinforce the hegemonic culturally idealized type. However, male prisoners do assume such forms of ‘feminized’ masculinity, and these subject positions directly affect their own sense of vulnerability and risk. The same interviewee continued: I was my most vulnerable because I was sick I was suffering anxiety. And when that happened my confidence went down, my reserve went down. […] I was vulnerable to attack and then they [other prisoners] start to play with you and they mess with your head, they do it really well.
This excerpt illustrates the importance of a strong and healthy mentality, and how emotional ‘weakness’ induces feelings of intimidation and insecurity, exacerbates physical vulnerability and impedes the kind of masculine presentation that can mitigate the different manifestations of penal vulnerability/risk. 7 This prisoner’s inability to manage his anxiety and emotional instability in a normatively masculine way (suppressing, ignoring or externalizing his emotions) created vulnerability and forced him into a subordinate position, where he felt intimidated by the other prisoners. Gendered risk strategies are thus essential to the constitution of hegemonic and prison masculinities more generally. Overall, men who conceal their vulnerabilities by mobilizing a masculine presentation, a ‘masked performance’ of their gendered self (Crewe et al., 2014), are more able to navigate the gendered risks of imprisonment. This process contributes to the production of prison masculinity and illustrates how masculinity is fluid, changing with prisoners’ risk experiences and forms of management, as well as over time and space. Awareness of the coexistence of a range of masculinities and the circumstances that they are deployed in and produced then offers a better understanding of how risk and punishment are gendered and have gendered effects.
Arbitrary and temporal components of prison environments
By definition, prisoners lack autonomy, are subjugated to penal power, and are susceptible to the arbitrary discretion of correctional officers, treatment professionals and other prison staff. This uncertainty is an inherent characteristic of imprisonment that is very difficult to calculate, predict and manage. It tends to undermine the carefully calculated forms of risk management that prisoners undertake.
Many respondents referred to the power and influence of prison staff in their daily lives and how ‘invisibility’, compliance and tolerance with staff demands are critically important aspects of doing time. Staff members can influence parole eligibility, segregation decisions, cell placement, visits, recreational times, access to healthcare and institutional transfers. Regardless of compliance, our interviewees felt that administrative decisions were largely out of their control, and felt at risk of being reprimanded for behaviours that they felt unable to control: So the warden really wanted whoever stopped this whole thing [an event at the prison] from happening to be punished for it. He told the guards that whoever they saw on the range that day; they just took anybody that was standing there, they took all of us to the ‘hole’. I was surprised they shipped me to [maximum] because I didn’t have a bad record and I was actually a range rep, I finished my high school diploma there.
This example epitomizes the lack of certainty, security and predictability experienced by prisoners, and how prisoners are ‘always at risk’ of adverse institutional decisions, regardless of whether they are able to establish some semblance of security and comfort, or whether they comply with official expectations of ‘rehabilitation’ (e.g. complete education or skill development programmes). Prisoners are in a perpetual state of uncertainty, where ‘anything can happen’ in relation to their penal futures. Our interviewees referred to lacking control over their own future, and feeling repressed and admonished by more authoritative others. In this sense, they occupied a gendered subject position that countered the hegemonic masculine ideal. The relational qualities of hegemonic masculinity are further complicated by the fact that prisoners are also subordinate to female correctional officers, who regulate the most mundane aspects of daily living. Here, the relational, structural and individual configurations of masculinity converge to demonstrate how prison staff also actively embody normative masculinities and produce, navigate and mitigate gendered risks as well as hegemonic masculinities. Although the issue has not yet been explored in depth, the introduction of female officers into the penal environment further complicates the gendered dynamics of men’s prisons (see Britton, 2003).
Our interviewees said they were also acutely aware of the possibility of being involuntarily transferred to a higher-security prison with fewer privileges, less freedom and from which they were unlikely to be paroled.
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This uncertainty factored into their daily interactions with prison staff and other prisoners, during which they had to embrace non-normative masculine risk strategies of deference, obedience and docility. Thus, evincing how arbitrary and foreseeable exercises of institutional power destabilize hegemonic and prison masculinities and obscure the varied and nuanced ways masculinities coexist, intertwine and are assembled in prison. Most of our interviewees had been incarcerated in different prisons with different security classifications, so we were able to document the fluidity of masculinity and gendered risks, as well as the connections between masculinities and risk. Interviewees said that after being transferred to a lower-security institution, they tended to act more defensively, humbly and even submissively towards other prisoners and staff, abandoning their tough and offensive ‘manly’ personas. They described how they would display ‘good behaviour’ to remain in the lower-security prison or to be paroled. Often, this meant exchanging stereotypical ‘tough-guy’ behaviours for more compliant actions such as attending prison programmes, not speaking out and refraining from violence even if challenged. One man said, because I wanted to stay there [a lower-security prison] I was compelled to toe the line, if I want to stay there then I had to go along with their programme. Their programme is no violence and stuff like that. [I needed to] tone that down.
He negotiated the possibility of being transferred back to a higher-security prison by abandoning his aggressive and invincible self-presentation and choosing to act in a way that was consistent with the administrative rules and expectations. This example also shows how prisoners change their strategies as they encounter new risks (e.g. transfer back to a higher-security institution), and other risks (e.g. being stabbed) became less pressing. This kind of strategic choice illustrates the level of uncertainty that informs how prisoners mitigate perceived risk: they reassess their level of risk, and accordingly abandon or adopt masculine subjectivities that can mitigate this risk and its associated vulnerability. They strategically use masculinity in response to shifting risks, and as a result the dominant form of masculinity evolves within each specific relational, spatial and temporal context.
Conclusions: Strategic masculinities
Masculinities can take radically different forms in diverse environments. The existing literature on prison masculinities does not sufficiently capture the nuanced differences in how forms of gender are tempered and change within penal cultures and structures. Our interviews revealed that hegemonic masculinities are strongly linked to the diverse experiences of risk and vulnerabilities in decidedly uncertain prison environments and the gendered strategies prisoners use to negate perceptions of ‘weakness’. Masculine subjectivities evolve and shift based on perceptions of risk in various penal contexts because prisoners implement various gendered risk management strategies in direct response to the specific vulnerabilities they faced at any given time. Some interviewees referred to physical aptitude, muscularity and ‘masculine’ personality traits, while others spoke of assuming a ‘feminized’ victim and/or masculinized perpetrator role, based on which presentation of masculinity they thought would best minimize their vulnerability and improve their capital and status in the social hierarchy.
We have illustrated the range of risks/vulnerabilities experienced and managed by prisoners throughout their incarceration. The distinctive manifestations of physical and emotional vulnerabilities are, in many ways, interrelated, mutually constitutive and often exacerbated by uncertainty within the institutional context, particularly the perceived arbitrary exercises of power shaping prison living. Prisoners employ a multitude of behavioural strategies in response to their perceived vulnerabilities. As with risk, these strategies are gendered, vary between the different penal settings and are renegotiated in light of each prisoner’s changing perceptions of risk. We have argued that men use a range of nuanced masculinities to navigate everyday life in prison based on what they consider risky or non-risky in a particular time and place. Said another way, prison masculinities, including hegemonic varieties, are perpetually being (re)produced through the management of penal vulnerabilities/risk, whose supersession is connected to the management of gendered vulnerabilities. Thus, a variety of masculinities are present in prison, each in their own way contributing to the production and maintenance of the archetype of the masculine prison space. Risk and masculinity in prison are mutually constitutive insofar as prisoners’ perceptions and experiences of risk are gendered and shape gender performances. However, experiences of risk, and strategies used to manage risk are not the sole determinants of gender performance in prison. Some respondents said they had acted violently or aggressively because of anger or frustration, demonstrating that not all behaviours in prison are guided by calculated action. Irrational and arbitrary actions by staff members also contribute to the uncertainty of imprisonment and affected the strategies used by prisoners. Still, our interview data demonstrated that in general, prisoners’ masculine presentations are guided by their assessment of risk across different penal settings, and that these risk perceptions (and their management) shape the overall prison culture.
Risk strategies are contingent on the penal context (higher-security vs lower-security facilities) and prisoners’ changing conceptions and experiences of risk. In more violent penal environments, where physical vulnerability is salient, prisoners may be more likely to use overstated aggressive masculine presentations to minimize harm, which in turn perpetuates or exacerbates the existing physical risks and, as a consequence, reproduces masculine ideals. Therefore, masculinities, risk/vulnerabilities and prisoners’ risk strategies are mutually constitutive. Prison cultures and structures encourage prisoners to abandon or adopt strategically various masculine subjectivities as they navigate penal risks and uphold their masculinity. Importantly, the more appropriate a prisoner’s strategy, the more effectively it mitigates risk, decreases vulnerability and consequently increases status.
Other gender scholars have conceptualized hegemonic and other masculinities as versatile constructions (e.g. Connell and Messerschmidt, 2005; Messerschmidt, 2012). Building on this work, our analysis of the adaptive strategies used by prisoners provides a more nuanced understanding of how individual prisoners are positioned within and actively navigate the gendered penal environment, and how masculinities and gender norms more broadly are constructed in response to vulnerabilities and moulded by local and cultural contexts. Hegemonic masculinities are conceptualized as a fluid and malleable concept that is contingent on how prisoners perceive risk and evolves as men try to negotiate their vulnerabilities via gendered strategies of action, enabling various forms of masculinities to be constituted as hegemonic in different penal contexts. Our analysis has revealed some aspects of how masculinities are constituted and demonstrated their instability, an observation that has been under-theorized in prison literature. Although focused on the prison environment, our results are also applicable to a broader conversation about the nexus between masculinity, risk and vulnerability. For example, related questions arise within different social contexts (e.g. sports, health or politics) such as: how are different masculinities created in tandem with different manifestations of risk and vulnerability? Is hegemonic masculinity produced in relation to men’s (in)ability to respond to and negotiate various risks?
Wacquant (e.g. 2001, 2009) focused on the similarities between prison and the communities from which many prisoners come. In future research, it would be informative to expand our analysis to explore how prisoners’ pre-prison understandings of masculinity influence how they negotiate their masculine subjectivities and develop strategies to mitigate risk in prison. Additionally, exploring how risk management inside prison impacts prisoners’ masculine performances after release may help clarify the (dis)continuities in how men understand masculinity and risk, and the exact role imprisonment plays in shaping these understandings.
Footnotes
Funding
This work was supported by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada [standard research grant].