We were recently given the opportunity to visit the County jail in downtown Cleveland. I have heard many great things from past students who have taken Women and Crime but many of them mentioned how nerve-racking it was. Although I was flustered even before I stepped into the building, every step we took, getting closer and closer to the actual cells made me more anxious. The closest I have ever been to a jail was watching one on T.V. so I had certain expectations of what I would see. What I did see surprised me. It was extremely clean, there was absolutely no mess and everywhere we walked smelled sterile. I was also expecting it to be very noisy, but I barely heard any footsteps, let alone people talking. We talked to 5 women, many of their
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In Ferrao and Moe’s article “The Impact of Mothering on Criminal Offending,” they describe the “good mother” ideology as being white, feminine, wealthy, heterosexual, self-sacrificing and one who has not gotten in trouble with the law; any women who does not fit all of those roles is deemed “bad” (2003). Allison clearly feels guilty for what placed her in jail for this current time but she has absolutely no reason to feel bad for anything prior since that life was aggressively forced upon her. However, these feelings are common, according to Ferrao and Moe, claiming that once a woman has a child they become part of her identity, and once they are incarcerated and leave their child behind, it negatively effects their judgements about themselves (2003). Years after this traumatic incident, she told us she relapsed into drug use again because of something that triggered her past memories. In “Coping, Resisting and Surviving,” Elizabeth Comack makes it a point that many women use drugs to cope with the massive amounts of abuse they suffer through (2005). Allison already knew what it was like to be on drugs, and although it was not right, it was the only way she knew how to cope with such severe trauma. Jaime was brought to
In Ferrao and Moe’s article “The Impact of Mothering on Criminal Offending,” they describe the “good mother” ideology as being white, feminine, wealthy, heterosexual, self-sacrificing and one who has not gotten in trouble with the law; any women who does not fit all of those roles is deemed “bad” (2003). Allison clearly feels guilty for what placed her in jail for this current time but she has absolutely no reason to feel bad for anything prior since that life was aggressively forced upon her. However, these feelings are common, according to Ferrao and Moe, claiming that once a woman has a child they become part of her identity, and once they are incarcerated and leave their child behind, it negatively effects their judgements about themselves (2003). Years after this traumatic incident, she told us she relapsed into drug use again because of something that triggered her past memories. In “Coping, Resisting and Surviving,” Elizabeth Comack makes it a point that many women use drugs to cope with the massive amounts of abuse they suffer through (2005). Allison already knew what it was like to be on drugs, and although it was not right, it was the only way she knew how to cope with such severe trauma. Jaime was brought to