Lecture questions in Parts 1, 2, and 3 are based on Joyce M. Pollock, Prisons: Today and Tomorrow.  Lecture questions in Part 4 are based on Robert Johnson, Hard Time: Understanding and Reforming the Prison, 3rd edition.

Part 1
Lecture Questions 1
"Why Imprison?"

1. Explain the theory of retribution, in terms of the rights of society and the rights of the criminal.

2. What are the three main purposes of punishment associated with the Utilitarian rationale?

3. What ideas did Bentham and Beccaria advance about punishment?

4. Contrast the conservative, liberal, and radical approaches to the purpose of imprisonment in society.

5. What other recent approaches to imprisonment does the author discuss?

Lecture Questions 2
"Race and Gender"

1. What do the numbers show about women in prison and minorities in prison?

2. What does Johnson mean in saying that "the penitentiary was the first truly modern prison?"
3. Contrast the Pennsylvania or separate system and the Auburn or congregate system.

4. How were women confined in the early penitentiaries?

5. Why were few minorities found in the early penitentiaries?

6. What effect did the reformatory movement have on the imprisonment of women?

7. Describe the "Big House," according to Johnson.

8. What humanitarian milestones does Johnson suggest changed the nature of prison life in the Big House?

9. What was an inmate's life like in the Big House of the early 1900s?

10. How did the "correctional institution" evolve? How was life in this institution different from life in the Big House?

11. What further changes does Johnson see in the development of the contemporary American prison?

12. Thought question. From the inmate's point of view, what would be the advantages of confinement in each of the phases of the American prison--the early penitentiary, the Big House, the correctional institution, and the contemporary prison?

Lecture Questions 3
"Overcrowding"

1. Are prisons overcrowded? How much?

2. What do correctional administrators attribute overcrowding to?

3. What changes are occurring in the specifics of who is being sent to prison?

4. What specific changes have been made in sentencing practices?

5. What impact has the War on Drugs had?

6. What effects has overcrowding had on prison life and management?

7. What can be done to fight overcrowding? What have we done so far?

8. What does Merlo seem to think of the California "three strikes" law?

9. What does she mean by the "social costs of prison expansion?"

Lecture Questions 4
"Prisoners' Rights"

1. What was the "hands off doctrine?" How did the courts justify non-intervention on behalf of prisoners?

2. What is a Section 1983 lawsuit? What is the standard of negligence that must be established to collect damages?

3. What was the significance of the case of Holt v. Sarver (1970)?

4. What do prisons have to provide today in terms of law libraries and the assistance of counsel?

5. What can prisons do to control inmate correspondence, mail, and media contacts?

6. What is the significance of the "legitimate penological interests" rule of Turner v. Safley (1987)?

7. What kind of medical treatment do prisoners have a right to?

8. What is the importance of the case of Wolff v. McDonnell (1974)?

9. Do prisoners have "too many rights?" Explain.

Part 2
Lecture Questions 5
"Classification"

1. What does classification mean?

2. How did it originate?

3. How is classification used today?

4. What are the phases of a model classification program?

5. Why is classification important to the inmate?

6. What are the main psychological assessment tools used in classification today?

7. If you were an inmate, how would you respond to classification?

Lecture Questions 6
"Work and Education"

1. What was the role of prison labor in early corrections?

2. What happened to prison labor in the 20th century?

3. What is UNICOR?

4. What is the PIE Program?

5. What are common forms of prison labor today?

6. Discuss the main issues related to prison labor today. If you were a prisoner, would you want to work? Why or why not?

7. Did education matter in early prisons?

8. When did education of prisoners become important, and why?

9. How do education and vocational training affect recidivism?

10. What are the common forms of education and vocational training available to inmates in prisons today?

11. Should prisoners receive vocational training? Education? How about college education?
Lecture Questions 7
"Rehabilitation"

1. Contrast rehabilitation and prisonization. Where did the idea of rehabilitation come from? 
2. When was rehabilitation emphasized? When did it go into decline, and why?

3. What types of prison activities made up rehabilitation, broadly defined?

4. What are common psychological and social therapy modalities applied in prison?

5. What are some of the issues that complicate counseling in prison?

6. What about counseling of "special needs" populations? How do prisons work with these people?

7. What are important difficulties in trying to determine if prison treatment programs work?

Lecture Questions 8
"Inmate Social World"

1. How have the make-up and characteristics of the American prisoner population changed recently?

2. Describe a typical prison inmate.

3. What do we mean by a prisoner "subculture?"

4. Contrast the deprivation and importation theories of subculture origin. What are the main elements of each theory?

5. List the main principles of the inmate code in the old prison.

6. How does prison argot tie in to the code?

7. What are some of the most important inmate roles defined by the argot?

8. Contrast the myth and the reality of the subculture in relation to each of these subjects:
a. snitching
b. homosexuality
c. leadership
d. solidarity and loyalty to the code

9. Define "prisonization."

10. How have prisons changed from the early 1960s to today?

11. What effects have prison gangs had on the prison subculture?

12. What are the different types of violence that occur in prison?

13. What does Pollock mean by "niches and sanctuaries?"

14. How does the subculture of the women's prison contrast with that of the men's prison?

Part 3
Lecture Questions 9
"Correctional Management"

1. Compare the prison's internal and external environments.

2. Describe the management style of the autocratic warden.

3. How does the style of the bureaucratic warden differ?

4. What are the elements of the control model as a prison management style?

5. Contrast the Theory X and Theory Y management styles.

6. What are the main forces, internal and external, that prison managers have to contend with today?

7. How was the management of the women's prison different historically?

8. What special problems are associated with the management of the women's prison today?
9. Thought question: What characteristics would make for the ideal warden?

Lecture Questions 10
"Correctional Officers"

1. What sort of popular image do correctional officers have?

2. What are the different types of job assignments to which correctional officers are assigned? What determines who goes where?

3. What kinds of power do correctional officers have to get inmates to do things?

4. Contrast the "custody-oriented" and "professional" correctional officers.

5. How do females do as correctional officers? What kinds of work styles do they develop? What do male officers think of them?

6. What types of alienation of correctional officers do Poole and Regoli identify?

7. How prevalent are brutality and corruption among correctional officers?

Lecture Questions 11
"Jails"

1. How are jails different from prisons?

2. What were the problems of early American jails?

3. What is the mix in the jail population of today?

4. How has jail architecture changed recently?

5. What kind of people work in jail?

6. If I say jail overcrowding can be worse than prison overcrowding, what do I mean?

7. What are the special needs offenders often found in jails?

8. Does the jail have a subculture? Explain.

9. What do Thompson and Mays suggest be done to improve the future of jails?

Lecture Questions 12
"The Future"

1. What are the historical origins of privatization in corrections?

2. Why did private involvement in corrections get such a bad name in the South?

3. Why has private corrections boomed the past 15 years? What advantages do advocates of privatization claim?

4. Explain the different types of involvement of the private sector in corrections today.

5. What are the major private corrections corporations in the U.S. today?

6. What obligation does the state have in its relations with the private sector? How can it fulfill this obligation?

7. How has drug law enforcement affected prisons recently?

8. What does Pollock mean in saying that "the lines between jail and prison populations are blurring?"

9. What do correctional industries need to gain public acceptance?

10. What does Pollock about the future direction of prison programming? 

Part 4
Lecture Questions 13
"The Prison in Society"

1. In his opening discussion of the roots of imprisonment, what does Johnson identify as the most serious problems of prisons today?

2. If we discuss making prisons better, people raise "less eligibility" issues; explain what this means.

3. Johnson says prisons should teach prisoners "mature coping." How does he define this? What obstacles stand in the way of achieving this goal?

4. What should a decent prison provide its inmates?

5. What were early prisons like? What was the Mamertine prison? What purposes were such prisons intended to serve?

6. How does the idea of quarantine relate to the prison?

7. Johnson sees conditions in plague-stricken towns as being similar to those of maximum security prisons that developed later. What similarities does he describe?

8. What purposes was the disciplined isolation of the penitentiary intended to serve, according to Johnson?

9. What did colonial American communities do before penitentiaries were created?

10. What did the Age of Enlightenment contribute to prison reform?

11. As responsibility for the "dependent classes" passed from the community to the state, what other modern social institutions developed?

12. What reasons does Johnson give for the enthusiastic public and political support for the penitentiary?

13. Contrast the separate and congregate penitentiary systems.

14. Compare the notions of the militaristic versus the monastic regime.

15. The analogy is made between the factory and the penitentiary, which developed along parallel lines. What similarities exist here?

16. Why did the congregate system win out as the more influential prison model?

17. Apart from the ideologies involved, how were prisoners treated as human beings in the early penitentiaries?

18. Penitentiaries were supposed to make criminals better human beings prepared for a productive role in society upon their release. Did this work in practice?

19. Why was isolation such a key element of the penitentiary regime?

20. What did Charles Dickens think about the American penitentiary?

21. What does Johnson mean by "the painful facts of prison life?"

22. What points does he make about the ideals and reality of the Elmira Reformatory?

23. He refers to the penitentiary of the early 1900s as the "Big House." What was the environment of this prison?

24. What humanitarian milestones does he identify as making prison life more bearable?

25. What "inhumanitarian" features also marked this institution?

26. What was the idea of the "correctional institution?"

27. Johnson calls the prison of today the "violent prison." Why?

28. What are his arguments about pain becoming more civilized over time? What three stages has the civilization of punishment passed through?

29. If prison is deprivation, what are the most important things prisoners are deprived of?

30. Are punishments today "tame" in comparison to those of earlier times?

Lecture Questions 14
"Prison Life"

1. What are the elements of mature coping, as Johnson sees it?

2. What is the prisoner's version of the Golden Rule?

3. Explain the concept of a "lifestyle criminal."

4. How important are deception and violence in prison?

5. Explain the concept of "altruistic egotism."

6. How does the single-parent home relate to chronic offending, according to Johnson?

7. What does Johnson suggest about the nature of friendship in prison?

8. What kinds of attitudes do prisoners have about their relations with others?

9. What does it mean to say that a prisoner is "institutionalized?"

10. Why would some prisoners choose life in the cell over life in the yard? Did lifers differ from short term inmates?

11. What does Johnson mean by niches and sanctuaries?

12. What does the author say we must do to help offenders "go straight?'

13. How has the convict culture of violence evolved over time?

14. What was the role of the BT's in the Texas prison system?

15. What was the prisoner code in the era of the Big House? Did most inmates live up to the code?

16. What brought about the end of the strict controls of the Big House era?

17. Why did penitentiaries become more violent after the 1960s?

18. What is a "state-raised convict?"

19. Who was Jack Henry Abbott? How would you summarize his views of prison violence?
20. What does Johnson mean in calling Abbott the "poster child for the state-raised convict?"
21. How would you describe the basic orientation of most prisoners toward prison life; that is, what is their approach to living in prison?

22. What are the dimensions of prison ecology, according to Hans Toch?

23. What strikes you about the prison diary of inmate George Malinow? Is he a "typical" inmate?

24. How would a convict go about arranging a niche away from the convict world?

25. What does it mean to do prison time "one day at a time?"

26. Contrast the outlook of the "old prisoner" versus the "new element."

Lecture Questions 15
"Prison Management"

1. What is the popular image of the prison guard?

2. What was the role of the guard in the Big House prison?

3. What was the stereotypical picture of the guard in the old prison?

4. What was the "Stanford Prison Experiment?"

5. Why would prison guards be "alienated?"

6. Describe the use of violence by guards--in the old prison and today.

7. What was the "goon squad?" Describe its work.

8. What does Johnson say about the environment of Walpole prison in the 1970s, in relation to prison guards?

9. Define the concept of "pluralistic ignorance."

10. Is there a difference between convict violence and guard violence?

11. What is Johnson's definition of a "true correctional officer?"

12. Is the work style of female guards different from that of male guards?

13. How does the guard's style relate to his job satisfaction?

14. In general, what are the activities the human service correctional officer may take part in to benefit prisoners?

15. Explain how guards act as referral agents and assist in inmate adjustment.

16. How did the role of guards change at Auburn prison, in Johnson's discussion?

17. Why should we even bother to try to reform prisons, according to Johnson?

18. What does "prison reform" mean, in his definition?

19. What is his concept of "warehousing?"

20. What does he suggest as the ultimate goal of prison reform?

21. What country's prisons does Johnson cite as the "most normal," and why?

22. Is the prison environment a normal environment?

23. How does classification fit into Johnson's scheme of niches?

24. Describe what a "functional unit" looks like.

25. How does this relate to "unit management?"

26. What does he mean by a supportive prison culture?

27. What does the concept of "nothing works" mean in prisons? Where did this term come from?

28. Explain Johnson's concept of collaborative training. What is the goal of this training?

29. Describe the operation of Canada's Living Skills programming.

30. How did inmates think the Living Skills programs had helped them?

31. Should inmates be required to participate in programs? Should release from prison be tied to program participation?

32. How does the operation of the Scottish Prison Service differ from what you would find in this country?

33. What does Johnson have good to say about UNICOR and PIE?

34. One more time: How does Johnson say prisons can promote "mature coping?"

35. Johnson says many prison leaders today lack a constructive vision of the prison. What does he mean by this?