Abstract:
This thesis utilizes narrative and social identity theories, as well as research
around the social impact of stereotyping, shame, and humiliation to evaluate the
narratives of twenty-seven currently incarcerated men within a maximum-security facility
in the Northeastern United States. According to Nelson (2001), how individuals view
themselves within the frame of master narratives may restrict moral agency and the
freedom to act, as well as one’s view of what they can do. Identity becomes damaged
through oppression and the deprivation of opportunity, and becomes twice damaged
through internalizing the negative views that other people hold, resulting in an infiltrated
consciousness.
The author, also currently incarcerated, designed and conducted the interviews
with three questions in mind: 1.) How does an individual’s self-narrative develop and
change through their experiences within the system? 2.) Do prisoners begin to adopt the negative stigmas and stereotypes impressed upon them by society at large? 3.) Is it
possible, based on the findings, to create counterstories that might allow prisoners to deinfiltrate
their consciousness, and reposition themselves in their own narratives despite a
significant lack of moral agency and self-efficacy?
The aim of the counterstory, according to Nelson (2001), is two-fold; changing
the oppressors’ perception of a group, along with the oppressed individuals’ perceptions
of self. By discovering themes in the ways that inmate identities have been damaged, the
author explores possibilities for the creation of counterstories which resist the master
narratives ascribed to prisoners, build narrative bridges to their communities, and include
the potential for narrative repair to occur. Through exploring authentic, and less
simplistic narratives of prisoners, it may be possible to spark a new conversation about
who resides behind the walls of America’s prisons, and how the process of incarceration
can be made less damaging, from arrest to reentry, ultimately reducing conflict by
reducing recidivism in the age of mass incarceration.
