Are We Really Colour-blind? The Normalisation of Mass Female Incarceration

Abstract

The sharp rise in female incarceration rates in both the United States and New Zealand has received increased attention. Even more pressing are the racial disparities among imprisoned females. This exploratory case study examines 13 peer-reviewed articles published between 2005 and 2016 to understand the nature of colour-blind ideology in discussions of female imprisonment in New Zealand. Several themes emerged including the homogenisation of female prisoners. Apart from moderately linking vast racial disparities between incarcerated White women and Indigenous to ill-defined colonial practices, contemporary explanations for the substantial racial disparities receive little attention. This article concludes that the absence of a critical lens toward contemporary forms and experiences of racism undergirding the mass criminalisation of Indigenous people perpetuates a colour-blindness that in turn works to normalise mass female incarceration. Even in attempts to be unbiased, the way race/ethnicity, gender, age, and class are discussed in academic research exploring female incarceration seems to reflect the influential nature of controlling images rather than critique them.

Silencing Prisoner Protests: Criminology, Black Women and State-sanctioned Violence

“…Black people comprise the vast majority of the sharp increase in the female incarceration rate. Conversations around the phenomena of racialized mass incarceration (Davis, 2014;Hattery & Smith, 2018;Norris, 2019) and police brutality (Hattery & Smith, 2018) The invisibility of prison resistance in mainstream criminology and media further silence incarcerated women, conceal state-sanctioned violence, reinforce the criminalization of Black women, and conceal private corporate stake in carceral institutions. Pointing out this invisibility is an imperative first step to give credence to and learn from women's resistance in prisons.…”

“…Relationships of domination and subordination inside carceral institutions are not fixed but are characterized by ongoing negotiations of power that warrants examination that centers prisons. incarcerated at twice the rate of Black women and six times the rate of white women (Norris, 2019). Policing of Indigenous peoples is rooted in colonial genocide that shifted from armies and militias to regular police forces.…”

“…Myths and stereotypes of Black women and girls being perceived as unruly, noncompliant, and aggressive combatants coupled with invisibly and anti-Black racism create unique conditions of subjugation and devaluation of Black female experiences with law enforcement and the criminal justice system that is legitimized (Crenshaw & Ritchie, 2015;Collins, 2000;hooks, 1981;Ladner, 1971;Lindsey, 2017;Norris, 2019;Willingham, 2018;Wun, 2016). Because Black women's bodies have been cast with racial-sexual stereotypes, such imagery often eclipse "the political images of Black female activism and agency" (James, 1999, p. 149).…”

“…The momentum of Black Lives Matter prompted a new national conversation on race and anti-Blackness (Bledsoe & Wright, 2019; Lindsey, 2018), but the movement primarily focused on Black men(Hattery & Smith, 2018;Lindsey, 2018, Ritchie, 2017.While cisgender Black men and boys are not genderless, the conflation of Blackness with Black maleness erases more than 50% of the Black community(Lindsey, 2018). State-sponsored violence against Black women at the hands of law enforcement is a chronic problem with colonial roots (e.g.,Bledsoe & Wright, 2019;Crenshaw & Ritchie, 2015;Hattery & Smith, 2018;Jacobs, 2017;Norris, 2019;Ritchie, 2017;Willingham, 2011;. For example, Black people are 27% of New York City's residents.…”

Daughters Inside: Toward a Theory of Structural Sexual Violence Against Girls Through Male Mass Incarceration

“…Research that attempts to explain the recent, sudden surge is reviewed in the first section of this article. The review concludes that much of the literature on women’s incarceration suffers from color-blindness as it neglects key quantitative and qualitative differences in racialized women’s experiences of crime and justice (George et al, 2014; Norris, 2017; Quince, 2010). Much of the literature also fails to consider that colonialism, historical trauma, and neo-colonial policies and practices may constitute explanatory factors for the contemporary mass incarceration of young Indigenous women (Cunneen & Tauri, 2016; George et al, 2014; Quince, 2010).…”