Prison Culture Essay

In the prison context, culture commonly known as prison culture includes the basic capacity of the inmates, the broader formal systematic environment, and individuals who populate inmates’ pathways to legal assistance (Grunseit 17). Other scholars argue that prison culture is squarely pegged on the day-to-day activities or experiences of the prisoners who are influenced by the official formal organization of the inmates (Hanser 236). These different definitions indicate that culture in prison has been a topic of academic inquisition from a complex of a variety of theoretical and methodological viewpoints. In such perspective, it is the purpose of this paper to provide a deep-rooted analysis on various definitions of prison culture. Prison culture is a collection of unique speech and eccentric collection of unofficial norms, standpoints, morals, statues, and positions that give detainees a unique outlook from the individuals on the free world (Rodriguez 3).

However, this definition ignores some standards such as sexual relationships encouraged by the inmates without the officers realizing. To explain, weaker inmates are delegated roles like making of beds, cleaning compartments and used for sexual satisfaction which are challenging norms for the officers. On the other hand, it has become common in the rapid-growing literature to describe prison culture as the adopted behavior system of numerous types of prisons stemming from the imprisonment conditions to help the prisoners curb challenges associated with prison life (Ricciardelli 46). The behaviors are profoundly influenced by the maladaptive subcultures such as the class society, unequal access to power, economic resources and prestige (McIntyre 4). As an outcome of the disparities and inequalities, each prison tends to function just like a small town or city.