TY - JOUR
T1 - Altering Violent Repertoires
T2 - Perspectives on Violence in the Prison-Based Cognitive-Behavioral Program Anger Management
AU - Laursen, Julie
AU - Henriksen, Ann Karina
PY - 2019/4/1
Y1 - 2019/4/1
N2 - Based on ethnographic research in three Danish prisons, this article explores meanings of violence among prisoners, as they are narrated in the context of the prison-based cognitive-behavioral program Anger Management. The empirical data shows that the prisoners’ and instructors’ perspectives and understandings of violence diverge in significant ways. We find that these discrepancies result in disputes and misunderstandings, where prisoners’ experiences of violence are devalued and rendered illegitimate in a treatment context where violence is considered unacceptable and a result of faulty thinking. Drawing on anthropological theory on violence as contextual, trivialized, and embedded in narratives of self, we propose a framework that enables reflections on violence more attuned to the prisoners’ own narratives and reasoning. Such nuanced understandings of violence could provide more durable ways of altering violent repertoires.
AB - Based on ethnographic research in three Danish prisons, this article explores meanings of violence among prisoners, as they are narrated in the context of the prison-based cognitive-behavioral program Anger Management. The empirical data shows that the prisoners’ and instructors’ perspectives and understandings of violence diverge in significant ways. We find that these discrepancies result in disputes and misunderstandings, where prisoners’ experiences of violence are devalued and rendered illegitimate in a treatment context where violence is considered unacceptable and a result of faulty thinking. Drawing on anthropological theory on violence as contextual, trivialized, and embedded in narratives of self, we propose a framework that enables reflections on violence more attuned to the prisoners’ own narratives and reasoning. Such nuanced understandings of violence could provide more durable ways of altering violent repertoires.
KW - anger management
KW - prisons
KW - subjectivity
KW - violence
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85046738568&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0891241618771153
DO - 10.1177/0891241618771153
M3 - Journal article
AN - SCOPUS:85046738568
VL - 48
SP - 261
EP - 286
JO - Journal of Contemporary Ethnography
JF - Journal of Contemporary Ethnography
SN - 0891-2416
IS - 2
ER -