Prison Culture/Inmate Code

Academic interest in the study of prisons and the inmate ethos has been largely attributed to the emergence of the “Big House” model of incarceration. Proliferating in the early 20th century, the Big House was more a hybrid of the penitentiary and industrial prison than one unique type of structure. These maximum-security facilities housed several thousand prisoners at any given time; to accommodate such large populations, Big Houses were typically characterized by cavernous cell houses containing as many as five to six levels, or tiers. Although Big House prisoners were permitted to congregate and socialize, order, monotony, boredom, and regimentation punctuated their lives. Coupled with the likelihood of serving sentences spanning decades versus months or years, the oppressive culture of the total institution created what Joseph Fishman first deemed an inmate subculture. While correctional architecture, goals, and policies have transformed the institution of prison, the inmate subculture remains an immutable and enigmatic feature of contemporary U.S. correctional facilities.

By its very nature, the culture of prison creates an immediate and overwhelming degree of deprivation in the newly admitted inmate (or “fish,” as they are oftentimes referred to by both prisoners and staff). This deprivation takes many forms, namely, the loss of one's freedom and liberty, material goods and services, heterosexual contact or physical interaction with loved ones, privacy, security and safety, and individualism or autonomy. The sociologist and criminologist Gresham Sykes referred to these forms of deprivation as the pains of imprisonment and noted that in many cases, they are far more difficult to navigate than the corporal and physical punishments associated with early prison life. In his essays Asylums, the sociologist Erving Goffman further conceptualized the deprivations incurred on incarceration, but on a more individualistic plane. The new inmate, Goffman noted, is stripped of any prior “homeworld” value. This process, deemed the mortification of the self, involves the conspicuous removal of any personal property or identifying unique apparel. The prisoner is then issued standard, institutional clothing identical to that of his or her fellow convicts. He or she is subjected to additional rites of passage, or degradation ceremonies—delousing, haircuts, measurements, and body cavity searches in full view of others. He or she is treated more as a child than as an adult and is immediately stigmatized and stereotyped as a marginal being. It follows, then, that the formation and proliferation of unique inmate subcultures is a group-generated defense mechanism—a manner of coping with the austere, mundane, and controlling atmosphere of the penitentiary. As in conventional society, subcultures emerge when persons sharing similar status, conditions, or situations form social enclaves for support and solidarity. For inmates, then, subcultural formation is the equivalent of creating and reestablishing some semblance of identity, power, and control where none previously existed. This entry focuses on two aspects of inmate subculture: (1) the convict code, or normative standard of prisoner conduct, and (2) the convict argot, or the language of prison.