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This page charts the history and growth of CC, as well as highlights early trailblazers such as Frank Tannenbaum and John Irwin.

Early Trailblazers of Convict Criminology

It should be noted that CC existed prior to the formal assembling of the group in the late 1990s.

Before CC was recognized as a collective and academic perspective, there were formerly incarcerated individuals who made substantial contributions to the study of criminology. In 2001, Stephen C. Richards and Jeffrey Ian Ross wrote one of the initial definitive articles of CC, Introducing the School of Convict Criminology, which announced our presence and perspective to the academic world.

Irwin used his social capital and resources as a respected and highly regarded academic to assist in the establishment of CC in the late 20th century. This, in turn, fills correctional facilities with hundreds of thousands of substance addicted citizens, and creates stronger illicit drug markets for foreign and domestic drug traffickers. During his time in prison he earned 24 college credits through a university extension program

Irwin later became a professor at San Francisco State University, where he taught for 27 years until his retirement.

In 1967 Irwin founded Project Rebound, a program which helps those coming out of prison go to college.

Irwin also served as a mentor and steadfast supporter of several other founding members of the group. At the same time, formerly incarcerated individuals, identifying themselves with CC, were becoming undergraduate students, graduate students, researchers, and professors in criminology, criminal justice, and sociology departments all over the world.

Texas (2003) to Prisons and Prisoners – Jay W. Borchert

Private Prisons, Criminological Research, and Conflict of Interest: A Case Study – Gilbert Geis, Alan Mobley, & David Shichor

Death By Incarceration as a Cruel and Unusual Punishment when Applied to Juveniles: Extending Roper to Life Without Parole, Our Other Death Penalty – Robert Johnson & Sonia Tabriz

Drug Policy & Families: Casualties of the War – Joyce A.

Arditti & Charles McClintock

Damaged Goods: Exploring Predictors of Distress in Prison Inmates – Andrew L. Hochstetler, Daniel S. Murphy, & Ronald L. Simons

Prevailing Injustices in the Application of the Missouri Death Penalty (1978 to 1996) – Michael Lenza, David Keys, & Teresa Guess

Seeing Shame: Legal Storytelling and Prisoner Rehabilitation – Alan Mobley

The View From the Other Side of the Fence: Incarcerated Women Talk about Themselves – Annette Kuhlmann

USP Marion: The First Federal Supermax – Stephen C.

Richards

Vocational, Educational and Psychological Assessments of Deaf Inmates – Aviva Twersky-Glasner & Matthew J. Sheridan

Supermax Prisons – Jeffrey Ian Ross

Logical and Consistent? At the same time, the profit-driven private prison industry is experiencing a boom under the repressive immigration and criminal justice policies being perpetrated by the current presidential administration.

 

Convict Criminology in the 21st Century

As CC moves into the twenty-first century, the substance and scope of its inquiry continues to develop. Irwin co-founded the Prisoners Union in 1971, which organized inmates to push for their civil rights and worked closely with the California legislature on the Uniform Sentencing Acting passed in 1976.

At a panel presentation at the American Society of Criminology’s annual conference in 1997, Irwin helped officially establish the Convict Criminology movement, in which convicts who became professors critically examine the criminal justice system.

Irwin was a Professor of Sociology and Criminology for more than two decades San Francisco State University. Historically oppressed racial and ethnic minorities account for a disproportionate percentage of the jail and prison population, and most of the citizens incarcerated by the “War on Drugs” continue to originate from positions of economic disadvantage.

An Autoethnographic Perspective on the Developments of the Digitisation of Prison Visits During COVID-19 – Dwayne Antojado & Nicole Ryan

Le travail prisonisé Le point de vue des détenus [< – Elton Kalica

Health Care in the Federal Bureau of Prisons: Fact or Fiction – Daniel S. Murphy

Exoffender Accounts of Successful Reentry from Prison – Heather Hlavka, Darren Wheelock, & Richard Jones

Lessons for Prison Re-entry from the Feminist Movement – Deirdre Caputo-Levine

A Phenomenology of Freedom: Finding Transcendence in Captivity – Mark Alexander

An Ex-Con Teaching Criminal Justice: The Etics-Emics Debate and the Role of Subjectivity in Academia – Daniel S.

Murphy

Self and Collective Efficacy in a Women’s Prison – Michelle L. Malkin

Glimpses Across 50 Years of Prison Life from Members of British Convict Criminology – Rod Earle & Bill Davies

Realignment in California: Policy and Research Implications – Barbara Owen & Alan Mobley

Kentucky’s Perpetual Prisoner Machine: It’s about Money – Stephen C.

Richards, James Austin, & Richard S. Jones

Parallels in the Prison Experiences of Women and Men – Richard S. Jones & Thomas J. Schmid

Sex and Sexuality in Women’s Prisons: A Preliminary Typological Investigation – Angela Pardue, Bruce A. Arrigo, & Daniel S. Murphy

Short Time, Hard Time: Accounts of Short-Term Imprisonment – James A.

Holstein & Richard S. Jones

The Overcrowding of Prison: Please Stop Talking about Square Metres – Elton Kalica

Convict Criminology Prisoner Re-entry Policy Recommendations – Stephen Richards, Jeffery Ian Ross, Greg Newbold, Michael Lenza, & Richard Jones

Prison and University: A Tale of Two Institutions – Rod Earle

Experiential Orientations to Prison Experience: The Case of First-Time, Short-Term Inmates – Thomas J.

Schmid & Richard S. Jones

Finnish Criminal Policy: From Hard Time to Gentle Justice – Ikponwosa O. Ekunwe & Richard S. Jones

Prisoner Perspectives on Inmate Culture in New Mexico and New Zealand: A Descriptive Case Study – L. Thomas Winfree Jr., Greg Newbold, & S. Houston Tubb III

Public Attitudes Toward Crime and Incarceration in Finland – Ikponwosa Ekunwe, Richard S.

Jones, & Kaley Mullin

Prisoners, Prison Executives, and Correctional Officers: Three Explorations into the US Prison Experience During the Era of Mass Incarceration – Jay W. Borchert

Decarceration Nation? The impetus for meeting and forming a group of self-proclaimed “convict criminologists” came from the frustration that formerly incarcerated students and faculty feeling that their voices, wisdom, and concerns were ignored.

Multiple, well-received sessions at ASC’s annual meetings and ongoing publications in reputable peer-reviewed journals granted CC further legitimacy. Penal Downsizing and the Human Security Framework – Alan Mobley

Le Travail Prisonise Le Point De Vue Des Detenus (Prisonized Work: The Point of View of Detainees) – Elton Kalica

‘Who’s the Daddy?’ – Ideas about Fathers from a Young Men’s Prison – Rod Earle

What do Ethnographers do in Prison?

La Ricerca Etnografica In Carcere – Teresa Degenhardt & Francesca Vianello

In Memory of John Irwin – Stephen C. Richards, James Austin, Barbara Owen, & Jeffrey Ian Ross

Convict Criminology – Stephen C. Richards, Greg Newbold, & Jeffrey Ian Ross

Convict Criminology: A New Way of Doing Prison Research?

– Rod Earle

It’s Been Hard to be a Father: A Qualitative Exploration of Incarcerated Fatherhood – Joyce Arditti, Sara A. Smock, & Tiffaney S. Parkman

Gangs and Environment: A Comparative Analysis of Prison and Street Gangs – Jennifer M. Ortiz

Knocking on Ivory Tower Door: Access and Inclusion of Higher Education via ODL in Prison – Muhammad Jeffery Hizwan & Oo Cheng Keat

Absent Voices: Experiencing Prison Life from Both Sides of the Fence – A Turkish Female’s Perspective – Safak Bozkurt & Andreas Aresti

Pratiche di conoscenza in carcere: Uno studio sui Poli Universitari Penitenziari – Gerardo Pastore

Stuck in the Carceral Web: Prisoners’ Experiences of Electronic Monitoring – James Gacek

The Impact of ‘Life’ Behind Bars: Understanding Space, Impression Management and Masculinity through Former Inmate Narratives – James Gacek

“Me Time”: (Re)Presenting Self and Carceral Spaces – James Gacek

‘Con-viviality’ and Beyond: Identity Dynamics in a Young Men’s Prison – Rod Earle & Coretta Phillips

Controlling Consensual Sex Among Prisoners – Jay W.

Borchert

How American-based Television Commercials Portray Convicts, Correctional Officials, Carceral Institutions, and the Prison Experience – Jeffrey Ian Ross & Vickie Sneed

Inmate Responses to Correctional Officer Deviance: A Model of Its Dynamic Nature – Jeffrey Ian Ross, Richard Tewksbury, & Shawn M.

Rolfe

A New Iron Closet: Failing to Extend the Spirit of Lawrence .v. Early CC scholars discovered that academia and the institutions of higher education could serve as powerful and legitimate conduits through which to deliver their knowledge and voices to society.