Exploring Issues of Confinement: Identity and Control

This volume presents a personal account of the experience of teaching Arabic in a French men’s prison; a reflection on the experience of confinement, taking the perspective of anthropological psychiatry, relating it to the hikikomori phenomena and claustrophobia, using Austrian philosopher Edmund Husserl (1859-1938) as its main reference; an account of the violence against women in Canadian prisons, and a reflection of human rights, oriented by Michel Foucault’s work (1926-1984) and; a consideration of an equal rights issue, by addressing the effects of the total tobacco and smoke-free policy, applied both to prisoners and staff, that is being considered by HM Prison Service (England and Wales). All chapters revolve around the ideas of identity and control, enriching therefore the debate on whether prison, as we know it, is an effective institution to promote edification. Ultimately, this is a volume that claims that it is necessary to re-think the institution of prison, reframing approaches, methods and rules, so it can live to its own expectations, embodying principles of justice, equal and human rights.