Si 1998 21 3 227 PDF

Going to the Crackhouse: Critical Space as a Form of Resistance in Total Institutions and
Everyday Life
Author(s): Jill A. McCorkel
Source: Symbolic Interaction, Vol. 21, No. 3 (1998), pp. 227-252
Published by: Wiley on behalf of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction
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Going to the Crackhouse:

Critical Space as a Form of Resistance in Total
Institutions and Everyday Life
JillA. McCorkel
Northern Illinois University
This article explores the extent to which organizational ic-ntity c.-ims and the
formal organization of social control influence how actors in a total institution
conceptualize their "real" selves. The setting for this case study is Project
Rehabilitate Women, a drug treatment program serving incarcerated female
offenders. Using Goffman's analysis of the total institution as a guide, I explore
the importance of "secondary adjustments" for self-definition. This analysis will
show that the capacity of residents to distance themselves from the label of
"addict" is contingent on the formal structure of social control. I will argue
that, in the absence of traditional distancing strategies, residents construct
"critical space" as an alternative means to subvert institutional control
mechanisms and to creatively acquire the resources necessary to articulate
definitions of self that are distinct from staff constructions. It is clear that
resistance, whether temporary or sustained, successful or failed, is central to
how subordinates maintain their sense of self in an environment committed to
radical self-transformation.
INTRODUCTION
Studies of the self in total institutions are provocative indeed, for they remind us of the
fierceness with which our most intimate possession can be stripped from our bodies and
purged from our thoughts as if it, or we, never existed. I am refemng, of course, to the elusive character of the self and the manner in which it masquerades as the property of the
individual, though all the while it is really a form of credit that is temporarily on loan from
the social. Like credit, the self does not exist outside the social arrangements that produce
it, and our ability to construct a respectable self-image from the roles and statuses we
occupy depends, in large part, on the substance and value of the resources those positions
afford us. Resources, in the form of material goods, status, reputation, and other sorts of
JillMcCorkel, Department of Sociology, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115-2854.
Symbolic Interaction 21 (3): 227-252

ISSN 0195-6086
Copyright 0 1998 by JAl Press Inc.
All rights of reproductionin any form reserved.
228
Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998
socially desirable attributes, buy us the necessary leeway from social audiences to put forth
a respectable image of self (Goffman 1963, 1959). It is the poverty of resources, then, that
makes studies of identity management in total institutions so compelling because such sites
become, in Goffmans (1961a, p. 12) words, forcing houses for changing persons; each is
a natural experiment on what can be done to the self.
Nonetheless, it is not simply the fact that prisons, mental hospitals, boot camps, and
other sorts of total institutions deprive their clientele of the resources necessary to construct
identity which earns them the title of forcing houses. As Schmid and Jones (1991, p. 415)
point out in their study of identity transformation in prison, it is the one-two combination of
the loss of resources and the intensity of new identity demands which produces the massive assault on the selves of inmates. All types of organizations, of course, make claims
about the identities of persons who participate in organizational life, and because these
claims determine, in part, the roles different individuals occupy, their status, and the nature
of their involvement in the organization, the claims have implications for how individuals
present themselves in the organizational setting and the ways in which individuals comprehend themselves as social beings (Horowitz 1995; Lofland 1969; Mead 1962; Strauss
1959). The impact of such claims on the individuals definition of self is variable, however.
It depends on both the emphasis the organization places on member identity as well as the
intensity of the individuals participation in organizational life and his or her commitment
to the organization (Lofland 1969). When compared to other types of organizations, total
institutions are forcing houses for identity change because their tremendous investment
in member identity (so much so that identity change often defines the mission of the organization) and the high levels of participation demanded of members (often involving residence within the walls of the institution) overwhelm the individuals ability to defend or
even retain his or her pre-institutional conception of self against the self claims levied by
the organization (Silberman 1995; Goffman 1961a; Lifton 1961). As a result of their
unique organizational structure, total institutions fundamentally shape the actors definition of self.
While it is clear that total institutions, with their explicit mission to transform the self
(e.g., mental hospitals and drug treatment programs), have profound implications for how
individuals come to define themselves, it is far from certain that organizational identity
claims alter an individuals sense of self. Indeed, transforming the self of another is not a
simple matter, particularly if it is deemed undesirable by those who are to undergo transformation (Horwitz 1984). Studies examining how persons with flawed selves manage
their liyes in therapeutic organizations and other varieties of total institutions have uncovered complex strategies used by clients, prisoners, patients, and workers to accommodate,
negotiate, and resist the efforts of the organization to alter their sense of who they really
are (see Horowitz 1995; Snow and Anderson 1993; Schmid and Jones 1991; Goffman
1961a).In all cases, the strategies individuals use to negotiate life in these institutional contexts are profoundly influenced by the structure of the organization and their ability to
exploit various types of organizational resources for the construction of an alternate definition of self. With this in mind, I set out to study the possibilities for resisting organizational
identity claims in an institutional setting that is, in many ways, more encompassing in its
Going to the Crackhouse
229
efforts to prevent resistance than most total institutions. Two related questions shaped my
research: Can individuals sustain a definition of self that is independent of, or even counter
to, organizational identity claims in the absence of resources for doing so, and, if so, by
what means is this accomplished?
The setting for this case study is Project Rehabilitate Women (henceforth PRW), a drug
treatment program housed in an isolated unit of a state prison for women. Residential drug
treatment programs are a striking example of the ways in which total institutions focus on
identity claims-making activities. At their most basic level, drug treatment programs, like
other therapeutic regimes, problematize the identities of their residents and make it their
mission to both abrogate the practice of drug use and transform flawed aspects of the
core self (Bloor, McKeganey, and Fonkert 1988). In keeping with the therapeutic tradition,
PRW seeks to rehabilitate its clients through inducing a transformation of the self. However, it does so in a manner that is consistent with the coercive control structure that characterizes correctional facilities (Silberman 1995). PRW can be described as a total
institution within a total institution because, when compared to the prison within which it
is housed, it boasts rules that are more restrictive, surveillance that is more pervasive, and
punishments that are more severe. Embedded in therapy practices are imputations the program makes regarding the identities of program residents as addicts and intrusive surveillance mechanisms designed to ensure total conformity with behavioral and attitudinal
norms. For the inmates in this program, drug treatment involves not merely locating, interpreting, and ultimately abandoning their drug use, but accepting an identity as an addict
and the implications this identity has on how they come to conceptualize their real
selves. In this sense, PRW represents a strategic site from which to explore the relationships among organizational identity claims, institutional mechanisms of social control, and
the dynamic possibilities of the self.
THE FLAWEDSELF IN THE TOTAL INSTITUTION

In Asylums, Goffman (1961a) argues that individuals develop a sense of self through the
dialectical process of accepting and rejecting organizational constructions of identity.
Through participation in an organization, members take organizational claims regarding
their identities as a referent from which to construct and present images of self. Members
can manipulate the presentation of self, but the range and substance of these manipulations
are constrained by the configuration of roles, relationships, and statuses within the organizational structure (Goffman 1974, 196la, 1959). Regardless of whether individuals accept,
reject, or modify the claims organizations make with respect to their identities, the claims
themselves are salient for the presentation of self. So, for example, while individuals
housed in psychiatric facilities may strongly object to claims that they are mental patients.
their persistent inability to sustain alternate definitions of self generates a level of acceptance of the organizational claim. In essence, they come to define themselves as they are
defined by the organization-as patients. Nonetheless, it is Goffmans (1961a) contention
that the individuals self can only emerge against something; put differently, individuals
define themselves according to what they are not (Strauss 1978). Subsequently, commit-
230
ment to the organization, as well as to organizational claims, is variable. Individuals never

fully embrace the organizations view of who they really are; instead, they undertake
their responsibilities to @eorganization to a greater or lesser extent as a means of distinguishing their real self from an organizationally imputed self.
It is important to emphasize that whether a real or core self lurks under the surface of
public claims and managed impressions is a point of theoretical controversy (Weigert
1986;Turner 1976; Goffman 1974; Stryker 1992; Blumer 1969; Rosenberg 1979). What is
critical for the purposes of this study is not the empirical reality of the core self, but the fact
that individuals interact with one another as i f a core self exists behind the trappings of
social roles, identity claims, and imputations (Weigert 1986; Goffman 1959). Distinguishing the real self is accomplished through forms of conduct which Goffman refers to as
secondary adjustments. Secondary adjustments are the unauthorized practices that the
individual uses to get around the organizations assumptions of what he should do and
what he should be (Goffman 1961a, p. 107). Subsequently, discursive claims made by the
organization are countered by the substantive actions of individuals in an effort to modify
or undermine the organizations definition of member identity. Tuckers (1993) study of
temporary workers, for example, demonstrates that workers distance themselves from their
employers and express dissatisfaction toward the work organization by engaging in various
resistance strategies, including illicit gossip, theft, sabotage, and noncooperation.
The degree to which secondary adjustments are undertaken and the form these practices
take is contingent on the structural features of the organization and the individuals position therein. As Vinitzky-Seroussi and Zussmans (1996) study of identity management at
high school reunions reveals, organizations in which members are granted considerable
autonomy and are subject to little surveillance are fertile grounds for rather creative and
potentially boundless efforts at the production and legitimation of social identities.2 This
context can be contrasted with Weinbergs (1996) discussion of a skid row therapeutic
community in which the efforts of the skid row men to construct an identity distinct from
organizational claims was limited by the high degree of scrutiny in the organization and the
very real threat that inauthentic identities (i.e., those that fail to conform to organizational
expectations) would result in immediate expulsion from the shelter of the program.
Goffman does not address the implications for self-definition in those contexts which
preclude an individual from engaging in secondary adjustments. His analysis would imply
that the failure to engage in secondary adjustments would be indicative of a surrender of
ones identity to organizational claims. Indeed, Hall (1985) suggests that the individuals
capacity to act as a stance-taking entity (i.e., to define the self against something) is entirely
contingent on the extent to which he or she has autonomy. When an organization is characterized by high levels of surveillance, limited opportunities for private interaction, and
random episodes of terror, the individual is precluded from resistance activity, and, thus,
counter-definitional claims. A number of scholars have referred to this process as brainwashing or psychic coercion (Silbeman 1995;Wrong 1988; Lifton 1961). The inability
to engage in secondary adjustments and to distance oneself from the organization through
alternate sets of interactions increases the likelihood that individuals will ultimately surren-
231
der their self-conceptions to the organization, thereby becoming what they are told they are
(Lofland 1969).
Nonetheless, we do not know the extent to which any organization, even the total institution, is capable of eliminating opportunities to engage in secondary adjustments. Muedekings (1992) study of inmates in a maximum security prison reveals, for example, that
while structural features of the prison forced inmates to assume convict identities such as
gangbanger or bad ass during the course of their daily lives in the institution, they were
periodically able to negotiate with guards the assumption of more conventional identities
such as parent or student when they received visits from outsiders. During Goffmans
(1961a) research, the staff tacitly allowed patients to have free places (i.e., areas in the
facility that were not subject to surveillance). It was through the availability of free places
that patients were able to engage in secondary adjustments and define themselves in opposition to the staffs claims.
INSIDE TREATMENT:
AN OVERVIEW OF THE FIELD SITE
PRW is housed in a state prison for women on the east coast. The program is organized
according to the therapeutic community model (henceforth TC) which is based on the
belief that addiction is a symptom of a disordered or diseased personality (DeLeon
1995a; Lockwood and Inciardi 1993). Advocates of the TC model vary in their assessments of the cause(s) of addiction and disordered personalities, although most agree that
these conditions are the product of a complex of biological, psychological, and social factors (Barthwell et al. 1995; Pan, Scarpitti, Inciardi, and Lockwood 1993). Along with different emphases in the apportioning of causality among biological, psychological, and
social variables, there are structural differences among therapeutic communities which
produce considerable variation in the kind of relationships existing between residents and
staff (for further discussion of these differences see Bloor, McKeganey, and Fonkert 1988;
DeLeon 1995b; DeLeon and Ziegenfuss 1986; Sugarman 1974; Yablonsky 1965). PRW
most closely resembles the rational authority model, structured after its archetype,
Synanon (Lockwood and Inciardi 1993).The rational authority model is characterizedby a
bifurcated system of authority in which staff members serve as the fixed set of leaders in
the community. Beneath them, authority positions are graded, with residents occupying
positions of greater or lesser power according to their ability to follow a strict set of rules
and operate in accordance with the chain of command. Residents near the bottom of the
authority structure perform service functions in the community, such as laundry, cleaning,
or food service, while those at the top oversee the daily activities of those beneath them and
participate alongside staff in disciplinary confrontations.
The program places a premium on surveillance and conformity with program rules to
ensure that residents are working on themselves and are not faking their commitment
to rehabilitation. With the exception of general security policies, the program maintains
its own set of rules and prohibitions that are distinct from the prison facility. In general,
program staff, inmates, and correctional personnel acknowledge that rules for conduct
232
and surveillance are more extensive in the treatment program than in most other areas of
the prison. The program has five counselors, a director, a secretary, and one correctional
officer in the unit at any given time to ensure that residents are conforming with program rules. Moreover, program rules require that residents monitor one anothers behavior and report rule violations immediately to the resident overseer and a staff member.
Unlike the psychiatric facility Goffman (1961a) studied, staff do not allow residents to
have free places where they can do as they please While the counselors look the other
way. Indeed, efforts at surveillance and the architecture of the unit prevent this from
happening, since most activity occurs in a large central room and the interior of resident
rooms are easily viewed from several vantage points throughout the facility. Additionally, opportunities to leave the unit for travel to other areas of the prison are severely
limited and, when they arise, are usually undertaken in the presence of a staff member
or senior resident.
Penalties for rule violations vary depending on the severity of the infraction, the
offenders standing in the program, and the number of infractions occurring in the community more generally. Penalties typically involve the loss of freedom (e.g., demotion from a
position in the hierarchy, restrictions on telephone or visiting privileges, mandatory isolation, etc.) and the imposition of various types of work assignments (e.g., extra hours of
required cleaning, writing a report, etc.). All rule infractions result in a ritual of public censure wherein the accused stands alone before her peers and is confronted by the counseling
staff and resident overseers regarding her misdeeds. The substance and consequences of
these confrontations will be discussed in greater detail later in the analysis. However, it is
important to note here that all rule violations carry a penalty of public rebuke which
reminds residents of the pervasiveness of surveillance mechanisms and the efficiency of
the social hierarchy.
The program handled 250 inmates during its first three years of operation. Seventyseven percent of the women are African American, 17 percent are white, and 6 percent
are Chicana. The vast majority are serving time for drug trafficking, forgery, theft, and
violating probation (usually as the result of a positive drug test). Due to limited bed
space, the facility accommodates 42 residents at any one time. The women enter the program in one of two ways: (1) they are directly sentenced into the program by drug court
judges or (2) they are recruited into the program from the general prison population by
PRW counselors and correctional staff. The majority of women who were recruited into
the program report that they entered believing they would receive early release from
prison. Only 10 percent of the women report that they entered the program for the sole
purpose of obtaining treatment for drug use. Regardless of the circumstances surrounding
their entry, all residents must remain in the program for a minimum of 30 days. Residents who eventually drop out of the program receive penalties, such as increased sentence length, loss of institutional privileges, or temporary assignment into the prisons
maximum security unit. Despite these penalties, approximately 75 percent of the women
who enter the program leave prior to graduation, either because they are expelled by staff
or they drop
233
T H E ROLE OF T H E RESEARCHER
In 1994,I began doing field research in PRW during the programs fifth month of operation.
At this time, I was a member of a team of university researchers charged with evaluating and
documenting the programs development over a three-year period. In this role, I had access
to client files, program memos, newsletters, minutes of staff meetings, institutional memoranda pertaining to the PRW program and treatment services in the prison, and statistical
profiles of the inmate population maintained by the state department of correction. Over the
course of 30 months, I typically spent between ten and fifteen hours a week in the facility
participating in daily activities, attending meetings, therapy groups, recreational activities,
and individual counseling sessions, and hanging out with setting members.
The treatment staff encouraged me to assume the role of an auxiliary counselor who
would both report and sanction residents for rule violations as well as periodically direct
group therapy sessions, but I demurred and instead sought to create a role for myself that
stood outside the programs disciplinary structure. The decision to do so was premised on
my concern that acting in a disciplinary capacity would not only inhibit rapport between
myself and the residents, but would preclude residents from sharing those thoughts and
feelings about the program that were sanctionable. The role I assumed could be considered
an intermediary one. I was, for example, held to the same general set of rules as the residents and could be sanctioned for rule violation^.^ On another level, I retained a set of privileges consistent with the role of a staff member (e.g., I came and went as I pleased in the
facility, I was not required to share my thoughts or personal experiences during group sessions, I could meet privately with residents, etc.). Certainly, these privileges and my freedom in general suggest that my role was closer to that of staff member than inmate.
However, it is important to emphasize that, for both the residents and the counselors, the
critical distinction between my role and that of a staff member was my non-participation in
the disciplinary structure, as evidenced by the fact that I did not report anyone for rule violations, I did not participate in the public disciplinary routines (except when I was the target
of such routines), and conversations with me were kept strictly confidential. On one occasion, as I was taking great pains to explain to a new resident that I was not a lawyer, social
service worker, counselor, or prison employee, a senior resident of the program interrupted
me and said, Basically, shes our friend. What you tell her stays with her.
Assuming this intermediary role provided me with a unique insight into the underlife of
PRW. Indeed, as my relationships with many of the PRW inmates grew increasingly
friendly, they began to confide in me their doubts about the treatment program and, eventually, allowed me to be present when they evaded the surveillance of staff and discussed
how best to survive the program. The most persistent themes in these conversations
involved their overwhelming desire to express who they really were and their concern
that continued participation in the program would irrevocably alter their sense of self.
These themes are evident in the following quotation:
The counselors be cussing at you and all that. ...They can break you down only so far.
So much humiliation and then to break a person down. And what happens if that person
cant pick theirself up? Who is she then? Where does her old self go?
234
From these conversations, I developed a set of research interests about the program that
were grounded in the very questions residents of PRW raised about control and identity.
After receiving permission from the PRW staff and the evaluation team to conduct a separate research project in the setting, I began to focus more systematically on processes of
identity construction, with an explicit focus on the relationship between mechanisms of
institutional social control and the capacity of individuals to negotiate identity and definitions of self. I began to ask residents directly about the effect of the treatment program on
how they saw themselves, their interpretations of the identity claims made by staff, the
impact these claims had on organizing a sense of themselves, and the process through
which they managed to define themselves in this setting. Most of these conversations were
informal and spontaneous (often occumng during smoking breaks or study time) since
many of the residents (particularly newcomers) associated the procedure of a formal
interview (e.g., tape recorder, notepad, and the cadence of question-driven conversations)
with the clinical work practiced by counselors. Nonetheless, after several women
expressed an interest in discussing their experiences in the program in greater detail, I
developed an open-ended interview guide which used the categories raised in earlier conversations to structure preliminary questions and probes (see Kleinman, Stenross, and
MacMahon 1994; Strauss and Corbin 1990). A total of 60 current or former residents of the
PRW program agreed to be interviewed. All of the interviews were tape-recorded and later
transcribed, with interviews ranging from 90 minutes to 6 hours in length.
The data for this study are derived from these conversations and interviews with residents, my own observations in the setting, various sets of program documents, as well as
conversations and formal interviews with staff. Over the course of the 30-month period, the
program employed a total of twelve counselors, with six in the program at any one time.
Three counselors and the director were employed throughout the duration of this study, and
each was interviewed on two or three separate occasions regarding the origins of PRW, the
nature of their jobs and therapeutic work, and the problems the program encountered during its development. Among the group of counselors who would later leave the program (n
= 8), five agreed to be i n t e r v i e ~ e dIn
. ~addition, I interviewed three of the five correctional
officers who were assigned to the PRW facility about the nature of their work in PRW and
their reactions to the program. Interviews with counselors and line staff were tape-recorded
and transcribed, and they ranged from 40 to 90 minutes in length.
The analysis which follows is structured according to Lincoln and Gubas (1985) discussion of naturalistic inquiry as well as the techniques associated with the construction of
grounded theory (Glaser and Strauss 1967; Strauss and Corbin 1990). From the articulation
of the research question to the specification of a central analytic category, this analysis has
proceeded inductively. The questions asked by the PRW residents, as well as broad themes
emerging from conversations with both residents and staff, served as the central categories
along which phases of secondary and tertiary coding and analysis proceeded. What
emerged from these conversations, interviews, and observations is an overwhelming concern, both among staff and residents, with the inner self of residents and a desire to gain
access to this inner self by controlling key features of the interaction order.
235
In the first section of this analysis, I examine how staff conceptualize the true identity
of the women they treat and demonstrate how this image influences the organization of
social control which, in turn, seriously restricts opportunities for residents to negotiate or
resist the claims staff make about their identities. Next, I explore the reactions of residents
to the identity claims,issued by staff and the impact these claims have on how residents
come to organize their experiences and conceptualize their real selves. In the final section
of the analysis, I discuss the process through which residents are able to subvert the institutional interaction order and, concomitantly, articulate a definition of self that is distinct
from staff constructions.
BREAKING D O W N THE ADDICT

When asked to describe her role as a counselor in PRW, Rinda, who oversees the counseling staff and provides diagnostic advice, made the following comment:
I really see counseling as based on your patient. Who is your patient? In [PRW] our
patients are addicts. As a counselor, your job is to facilitate change-to heal. Here, I
treat addicts. To heal the addict, you have to get rid of all the stuff-the negative
thoughts and asocial behaviors-inside them that makes them an addict. Its like a disease that youve got to remove from inside them. I guess you could say that we [the
staff] are here to break them down-to break down the addict so a new person can
emerge.
The organization of treatment and the concomitant girding of social control in PRW
emerge from the complex framework staff use to conceptualize their clients. The techniques used to break down the addict are contingent upon the staffs understanding of
what addiction is and how it occurs. The staffs conceptualization of the kind of client they
treat derives from a disease model of addiction and from their own moral assessments of
the type of person who becomes an addict. In part, the program is informed by a disease
model which frames addicts as persons who are biologically and psychologically predisposed to the abuse of substances as an aspect of various psychiatric disorders (see Conrad
and Schneider 1992; Poikolainen 1982; Schneider 1978). In this model, addiction is considered a symptom and not the essence of the disorder (Lockwood and Inciardi 1993, p.
6 1). The essence of the disorder involves psychological and social dysfunction such
that the individual is handicapped in his or her capacity to think, feel, and act in accordance
with social norms (DeLeon and Ziegenfuss 1986).6
While the disease theory of addiction informs the nature of the treatment offered, the
actual deployment of treatment in PRW is influenced by the moral frameworks staff use to
conceptualize persons who are incarcerated and who use illegal substances. The counselors
in PRW do not believe that the disease of addiction strikes individuals arbitrarily; rather, it
is a disease that is brought on by the choices and actions of those it afflicts. Faith, a counselor who had no exposure to drug-using clients prior to working at PRW, observed during
an interview that the typical resident is a spiritual wasteland:
These are women without souls.. .. You cant do what some of these women do to earn
a buck or get a hit and still have a soul. When you lose your morals, your self-respect,
236
you lose your soul. You have no conscience; you victimize. They want to blame others
for their condition, but they had choices. When you get addicted, you lose your ability
to choose, but the fault is ultimately your own.
While Faith is unique in her charge that residents are without souls, all of the counselors
identify residents as women who are lacking in conscience and morality. The staff refer to
addiction as a disease, but they do not regard the women in the program as the unfortunate
victims of a virus, bacteria, or a bad set of genes. While staff acknowledge that residents
may be predisposed to substance abuse, they identify immorality as that which activates
the condition of addiction. Further, counselors differentiate residents in PRW from other
types of substance abusers on the basis of their participation in criminal activity. Counselors describe PRW residents as more manipulative than non-criminal substance abusers
and post signs around the program facility with such messages as, THE CRIMINAL IS A
VICTIMIZER NOT A VICTIM. Thus, members of the staff frame program residents as
persons whose deviant behaviors have been perpetuated by a disease, but a disease that is
caused by their own choices and actions.
To break down addicts, counselors presume they must heal that which has been damaged
as a result of their disease, while transforming those aspects of the self that are responsible
for contracting the disease in the first place. Treatment, then, works to both correct that
which is flawed and change that which is chosen. The dualistic character of treatment is
translated into a system of social control that operates to regulate both the actions and
thoughts of PRW residents. The following sections demonstrate the bifurcation of social
control mechanisms as they are applied to both physical and conceptual aspects of identity.
Control of the Physical Self

Social control directed at the physical level is intended to target and correct the symptoms of a diseased core self. For the purposes of this analysis, the term physical is used
to refer to all aspects of observable behavior. Extensive surveillance of behavior is the centerpiece of therapy in PRW. Staff use their observations of resident behavior to both diagnose the presence of addiction and to gauge resident progress through the treatment
program. Rinda, in a conversation with an incoming resident, explained the importance of
monitoring behavior:
Your behavior tells me about you. Everything you do sends a message about whats
going on inside you. I read those messages, and I can tell where youre at. If youre
lying or hiding or using, I see it. Addiction doesnt hide itself too well. ...
The control of behavior is thought to be significant because it implicates the core self.
According to the staffs philosophy of addiction, behavior and self are linked. Alterations
in one will generate alterations in the other. Indeed, staff frequently tell residents that, if
they act as if they are rehabilitated, their addiction will recede and they will eventually be
rehabilitated.
The program maintains a myriad of rules and prohibitions designed to regulate even the
most intimate forms of conduct. From dress to demeanor to personal hygiene, residents are
expected to conform at all times or face punishments ranging from personal admonish-
237
ments to placement in an isolation cell. Rules exist to limit resident movement in the facility (no impulsive behavior), to dictate proper facial expression and posture (sit in the
tight position with your back straight, hands on your knees, chin up), and to prescribe
modes of talking (no glorifying the war [criminal behavior]), walking (no walking out
of encounters or lectures without permission), and interacting (dont question authority). The director of PRW commented during one of our conversations that rules regulating all aspects of resident life are a central part of therapy:
Everything that goes on in here, from the number of hours clients get to sleep to the
number of hours they spend cleaning is part of their treatment. Everything we make
them do has a reason-a therapeutic value. Rules provide them with structure they
never had when they were addicts on the street. Rules are treatment.
The regulation of the physical self serves to inhibit residents from expressing themselves
through self-selected actions. In essence, the opportunity for an action-driven dynamic of
secondary adjustments that Goffman (1961a) posits as necessary for the development of a
distinct self is fiercely opposed in this setting. The seemingly endless minutiae of rules,
prohibitions, and punishments prevent self-expression even on the most basic of levels;
this constitutes the first layer of treatment in PRW. The second layer involves the control of
meaning and language structures.
Control of Conceptual Categories

Control over conceptual categories is undertaken by staff to alter the ways residents
define experience and conceive of their core selves. Conceptual categories are those interpretive frameworks and linguistic devices that individuals use to locate, comprehend, and
evaluate their experiences in the everyday world. Members of the staff attempt to exert
control over conceptual categories by prohibiting certain kinds of language and conversation, requiring that residents use program vocabulary and rhetoric to describe their feelings
and experiences, and engaging in public confrontations that are intended to reveal to the
resident who she really is. These three levels of conceptual control all work to promote
the hegemony of the therapeutic discourse. Prohibitions on street language and conversations that are critical of the program serve to prevent residents from organizing their
experiences on their own terms. Instead, program vocabulary and therapeutic rhetoric force
residents to define their experiences on the staffs terms (Bloor, McKeganey, and Fonkert
1988).
Upon entering the program, new residents are given a lengthy manual that details the
vocabulary used in the program and the programs philosophy of addiction. Members of
the staff regularly test residents on the material and expect them to be able to recite it verbatim after thirty days. Program vocabulary is used to categorize certain thoughts and
behaviors as desirable or undesirable. For example, residents who are critical of the program are defined as walking with the dead or in a bad space. Residents exhibiting
model behavior are defined as plugged in to the process or walking the walk of recovery. In essence, the program maintains its own set of folk categories (see Turner 1957)
that residents are required to use in the interpretation of their world.
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Of added significance is the staffs reliance on public confrontation as a ritual to legitimize therapeutic discourse. Counselors believe that, in order to break down the addict, they
must expose those feelings and behaviors that contribute to an addictive self. In this way,
staff redefine a residents feelings, actions, and experiences through use of program categories. Further, the use of dramatic confrontations demonstrates the proper ways in
which residents should inventory their own behavior as well as that of others. The following excerpt is typical of a therapeutic revelation strategy. This particular confrontation was
staged by the staff after a resident (who had been in the program for two weeks) sat at the
wrong table during lunch.
Counselor: You are so arrogant, Lisa. You know that, right? You think yous the
fucking greatest dont you? You think you know how to work thingsyoure gonna go sit with the older family members and not the babies
[new residents] because you think you more than all that? Well, I got
news for you, honey. Youre not more than all that-youre not all that
because you a fucking dope fiend is what you is. Youre a goddamn dope
fiend, and you still acting like one even after two weeks in treatment.
What you did, thats a dope fiend move, and that aint even a good move.
Lisa: But I dont understand this about the seating arrangements. Whats that
got to do with my recovery? I didnt do no dope fiend move.
Counselor: Did I give you permission to dialogue4ont even speak. I did not get
you permission to dialogue. You a dope fiend; youll speak when I tell
you. See, you still aint got it right-thats the dope fiend in you, got to
be all up in everyones face and interrupting the authority.. ..
Social controls directed at normative categories influence how residents conceptualize
their daily lives in treatment. Their thoughts, feelings, and actions all must be reorganized
in accordance with the programs categories and philosophy of addiction. In essence, program staff attempt to impose a pre-constituted meaning structure on the residents-a structure that residents have very little opportunity to alter or redefine. It is expected that as
residents use the therapeutic rhetoric of the program, they will come to see themselves as
staff see them and will ultimately be amenable to transformation of their core selves.
THE DEPLOYMENT OF PUBLIC SPACE

Physical and conceptual spheres are interdependent in that social controls are simultaneously directed at controlling both meaning frameworks and actions in order to transform
the core self. Their interdependence is captured by the metaphor of space that both program staff and residents use to understand their lives in the facility. When staff and residents refer to space, they are referring to either physical locations or conceptual
categories. Physical space, of course, refers to specific geographic areas within the correctional facility, such as resident rooms, offices, and recreation areas. Conceptual space
refers to the meanings and linguistic devices that staff and residents use to make sense out
239
of their experiences in the program. Staff, for example, refer to residents who have mastered the use of program rhetoric as living in a positive space.
In PRW, breaking down the addict through control of thought and action is achieved
through the promotion of the public. Public space, as it is defined by staff and residents,
refers to those areas (both physical and conceptual) that are fully regulated by organizational authority. It is nearly all-encompassing in that there are few areas, either conceptual
or physical, which the staff does not regulate. Most of the activity in the facility, for example, occurs in a large room in the center of the unit. When residents are admonished for
breaking a rule, they are brought to this room and confronted by the staff in front of their
peers. Members of the staff associate public exposure with the control and ultimate elimination of the addict self. When asked why residents are given almost no privacy, one counselor made the following comment:
Well, theyre addicts. What do you expect? The problem with addicts is if you give
them enough rope, theyll hang themselves. Its in their nature. The thing about addiction is that its a disease of the whole person-that means what they do in every part of
their life. I dont care if its pissing. You let them piss alone and theyll find a way to
fuck everything up. Thats who they are. Its the nature of the beast. ...
For the staff, public space and surveillance mechanisms serve to prevent the resident from
behaving and thinking like an addict. Granting residents areas of autonomy, what Goffman
referred to as free places, is considered contradictory to the therapeutic process.
The pervasiveness of public space is achieved through the elimination of private space.
According to the rules outlined in the orientation manual, there are no areas (either physicaI
or conceptual) that can be categorized as unregulated, private spaces. For example, during
the orientation sessions PRW staff hold for correctional officers newly assigned to the unit,
counselors emphasize to officers that they must not momentarily look the other way or
keep the confidences of residents since granting these zones of privacy is regarded as the
equivalent of fueling their addiction. In fact, there are no aspects of a clients feelings,
thoughts, or behaviors nor are there physical locations within the program facility that are
not viewed as subject to surveillance and control. Resident rooms, for example, are the
only areas in the facility that staff rarely enter. In this sense, they may be considered areas
of limited personal autonomy. However, staff not only control resident access to rooms,
they also exert control over behavior within. Residents are expected to follow the same
behavioral guidelines in their rooms that they display in the large group room, and members of the staff not only reward residents who report any suspicious or deviant behaviors
on the part of their roommate, but also punish roommates who fail to report such behaviors
if they appeared to have prior knowledge of them. As a result of the numerous rules regulating donduct in their rooms, residents do not view any particular area in the program
facility as a safe space. Betty Lou, a resident in the program for over thirteen months,
offered the following observation:
Theres nowhere to go where somebody doesnt see you. Youre never alone-I mean
never! You always got to be on your toes. Theys always watching. It gets tough, um tiring, being watched. You get to feeling real insecure.. ..
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Any behavior that takes place in a room is considered public knowledge. Many incoming
residents are horrified when their roommates report to staff and other residents highly personal behaviors such as masturbation, poor hygiene, snoring, drooling, diarrhea, gas, vomiting, and crying.
The promotion of the public is essential for organizational control. Residents are vigorously discouraged from keeping private memories, fantasies, or thoughts away from the
public eye of fellow residents and staff. Cultivating privacy through the concealment of
past events in ones life or ones feelings and fantasies is viewed by the staff as dangerous.
Concealment, as well as privacy, is associated with addiction and criminality. Indeed,
members of the staff often measure resident progress in the program according to the
degree to which residents make past events or feelings public. In one case, a resident who
had managed to keep her experiences of childhood sexual victimization hidden from everyone but the staff was informed by the senior counselor that, if she did not disclose her experience to the group, she would never overcome her addiction. She initially refused to
comply with the counselors request for fear that the news of her victimization would reach
a correctional officer who knew her parents. She ultimately acquiesced, however, because
she believed that the staff could prevent her from graduating from the program (and thus
leaving prison) if they believed that she was still an addict. A number of residents reported
similar experiences and suggested that women who spill (e.g., divulge private events)
move through the program more quickly than women who are believed to be concealing
aspects of their private lives.
DEFENDING THE SELF:

THE PRODUCTION OF CRITICAL SPACE
The organization of social control in PRW militates against the capacity of residents to
engage in secondary adjustments. Not only are free places an anomaly in PRW, but the
hierarchy is explicitly structured to prevent the formation of alliances among residents. It
will be recalled that, in order to progress through treatment, residents are required to report
their peers for rule violations. Failure to report other residents means that one will not be
promoted in the hierarchy and, thus, will not advance through treatment, thereby extinguishing whatever opportunities may exist for an early release from prison. In one case, the
staff accused Mary, a resident in the program for 25 weeks, of eating prohibited foods
when she left the facility to attend G.E.D. classes [n another section of the prison. Mary
denied the charges, which prompted staff to question four other residents who had attended
classes with Mary. When the four residents denied knowledge of the allegations, members
of the staff searched Marys book bag and found a candy wrapper. The staff ordered Mary
to perform several hours of cleaning over the weekend, while the other four residents were
stripped of their privileged job positions, had their visits with family and friends revoked
for a week, and were banned from talking to other residents for an unspecified amount of
time. By requiring that residents report one another, staff inhibit residents from verbally
expressing themselves to their peers. The net impact of these controls is that new residents
become confused about how to present themselves in the program, how to evaluate their
241
experience in the program, and begin to increasingly express concern about whether they
are really addicts.
The public confrontations, which are staged to expose the addict self, are undertaken
with increased frequency during periods when new residents enter the program. Indeed,
new residents are most frequently the targets of such confrontations. Following a rule violation, new residents are confronted by staff or senior residents who reveal how their
core selves have been poisoned by their addict identities. On one occasion, Terry, a resident in the program for three weeks, answered a telephone that had been ringing in one of
the counselors offices. When the counselor saw her do this, she called her to the center of
the room for a public confrontation:
What the hell are you doing? Dont answer yet, addict. You still an addict. Do you know
what an addict is? Its someone who cant keep out of other peoples stuff. Its someone
with a need to control. Its you, Terry. Youre an addict, and all the things you do are
related to that addict in you. See, you answered that phone cause youre so insecure, so
cunning. You waiting for a call or you just have a need to know about my business? Oh,
youre manipulative [Terry begins to cry]; pull yourself up, baby! You wont get pity
from me. Youre manipulative, and that phone shows me just how bad you need to be
in control. ...
Prior to being confronted by the counselor, Terry informed me that she had answered the
telephone in the counselors office even though it violated a rule because she thought she
would get in trouble if she ignored it and the counselor missed the call. When I asked her
the next day about the admonition, she gave the following response:
I dont know. I guess its okay. I guess I cant control myself, and the addict in me fools
me into thinking Im not manipulative. I dont know. I guess I did it to be in control.
Ive always wanted some control; maybe thats the addicts way of getting it. I guess I
just have to keep learning about why I do things.. ..
During the first few days or even weeks in treatment, many residents, in the absence of free
places or interactions in which they can be critical of the staffs message, become disoriented and begin to question their understandings of themselves as well as the motivations
behind their behavior in the program and on the street.
Questioning Identity Claims:

T h e Legitimacy of t h e Addict Label
Almost without fail, however, counselors ultimately make claims about the resident that
are either so inaccurate or so degrading that the resident is jarred from her initial confusion
and moved to defend whatever lingering sense of self she had prior to entering the program. Indeed, at some point, the majority of residents become angry and begin questioning
the legitimacy of staff assessments. Sandra, a resident who reported using marijuana infrequently prior to entering PRW, made the following comment:
You know, I havent been a career criminal or a drug addict or anything like that, so it
was like I was being called things that I was not, and never knew about until I came to
prison. It offended me, very much.. .. I mean, smoking coke, I dont even know how to
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do that, I dont, you know; and shooting drugs, I heard about it, but I never did that kind
of thing. I never knew what heroin was.. ..I just never was into it. If somebody calls you
a crack head, and youre not doing that, you would be offended. I was very offended by
that.
Residents also challenge the applicability of therapeutic rhetoric and identity claims when
a counselor mistakes the motivation driving certain actions. In one instance, Nika provided
clean (i.e., drug free) urine to another resident, who had been accused of snorting heroin
while in the program, so that she would pass the drug test. She did so because she anticipated that the staff would discharge the resident as punishment for her drug use. Nika
regarded this possibility as counterproductive since the residents actions indicated that she
was in need of drug treatment, but both women were caught exchanging the urine. In anticipation of the staffs reaction, Nika made the following statement to me:
You know, its good youre here to see this. Do you see how everything is different
from what they say it is? Im not some selfish whore that they say I am; Im in here trying to kick my habit, thats all. If I can help some people, so be it. Thats what it means
to me anyway .... Anyway, if they catch me, Im sure theyll tell you different. I just
wanted you to know the real me.. ..
Although residents often seek to reject the imposed identities that staff members construct, there are no negotiated areas in which to engage in secondary adjustments or identity protection strategies (Hewitt and Stokes 1975). As such, residents must actively
subvert staff control of the public by creating alternative spaces where they can question
and criticize the staffs constructions of their real selves and therapeutic rhetoric. Residents
refer to the construction these alternative spaces as going to the crackhouse.

In PRW, there is a small group room nicknamed the crackhouse, that is located in one
comer of the facility, and, unlike all the other rooms in the unit, it is partially hidden from
view. The room was given its nickname by the initial residents:
Well, I guess at first-wewere just saying that when there were people in there with the
lights off. You know, you cant see them back there.. . and with the lights off you dont
know whats going on. You just know they are doing something bad. Just like the crackhouse-youre hiding what youre doing, but you know its not right.
This room often serves as a forum for residents to critique the program and the counseling
staff, and to express to other residents that they are not what the staff says they are. It is not
a free place by Goffmans (1961a) definition because counselors are thoroughly unaware
of the subversive activities that are carried on in the room. Thus, there is none of the tacit
license that he observed in the asylum, and the subversive activities occur only when surveillance is minimal. One day in early December, staff broke the residents into small
groups and told them that they had free time to play therapeutic games. I walked back
with a group of seven residents to the crackhouse where we proceeded to play hangman
using words related to addiction or therapy. About ten minutes into the game, another res-
243
ident entered the room and closed the door behind her. No sooner was the door closed than
she began a barrage of complaints about the program:
Do you know what they [staff] did to me this time? They kept me on that contract [rigorous form of punishment]. They know Im trying, so whats the deal? They just out to
get me because they know we got one over on them. I swear this is it; Im taking to my
counselor. If she doesnt take me off this, Im leaving. I really am. Its not fair.
Her entire conversation was, according to program rules, strictly forbidden. According to
program guidelines, all of the women in the room should have given her a verbal admonishment and reported her to a counselor. That is not what happened. Instead, they agreed
with her that the treatment she received was unfair and that she should leave. Many others
expressed discontent about the program and expressed desires to leave. During that same
occasion, a senior resident instructed the group:
The game for counselors is to get you to act out. Sometimes they call you names they
really believe are true, and other times they do it just to get a reaction from you-thats
part of their treatment. You goaa accept it and not screw up-just hold it in until you
can leak [talk critically] to someone who knows you. The problem is that what they tell
you about you becomes real for everyone else in here. You just gotta know youre not
like all that and remind yourself of it whenever they start up.
Central to defending ones self-image from the verbal attacks of staff, then, is access to an
alternative set of meanings generated by a forbidden network of interactions. Defending
the self in a closed environment like PRW requires that actors have access to alternative
meanings that are generated through interaction with sympathetic others. Residents use the
phrase going to the crackhouse to indicate any interaction that involves criticism of the
program and an articulation of self that is distinct from staff constructions; it does not
always refer to the physical location of the crackhouse in the program facility. In short,
going to the crackhouse refers to the development of another type of space within total
institutions: critical space.
Constructing Critical Space

Consistent with the metaphor of public space in the facility, critical space occurs at the
intersection of physical and conceptual spheres. Physically, residents must have access to
locations where their actions and conversations will not be reported to staff. Frequently,
this means meeting other residents in the crackhouse when staff are not looking, although
critical space is not necessarily connected to a specific physical location. Clients can construct critical space in any area of the facility so long as they perceive surveillance to be
weakened. On many occasions, clients have used Alcoholics Anonymous groups as a vehicle for expressing doubts and exchanging information. These sessions occur in full view of
the staff offices, but the groups are rarely attended by staff and are only occasionally monitored. As the level of surveillance varies, so too does the location and pervasiveness of
critical space.
Conceptually, residents must refrain from using meaning structures generated by the
program to define and express who they really are. Underlying the construction of criti-
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cal space, of course, is the desire among residents to define themselves in a way that is distinct from the labels promoted by program staff and to critically examine the content of
program rhetoric. Residents alternate between conceptual categories to decipher how a particular behavior or attitude may or may not be related to their usage of drugs and alcohol,
and to challenge the staffs interpretation of their actions. In critical spaces, the women
recover a sense of who they are that is distinct from the kind of person that the staff says
they are. For example, one resident made the following observation:
When I came back from lunch, I went and laid down, which I wasnt supposed to do
until 3 p.m....Well, I guess they didnt know I was in there cause I fell asleep and,
when I got up, I tried to get out the door and they had locked it. I mean, it sounds weird,
but they had locked me in and I was like so psyched. It was like I was gone. They wasnt
gonna get to me cause they didnt know where I was. As soon as I thought that, I
thought, Oh my god, I can be who I want in here. You know, its like you can think
the stuff that youre not allowed t o 4 cant explain it. Its just that I could find my self.
I mean, thats weird, but its like I was gone and in that room I found myself again.
The development of alternative sets of interpretations is frequently accomplished through

interactions with other program residents who are themselves critical of program rhetoric.
Sharing doubts with sympathetic others allows residents to reestablish their own definitions of self. Identifying others who are likely to be sympathetic, however, can be both a
complicated and risky task. In general, they seek others with whom they have had interactions prior to their participation in PRW. In most cases, these are other residents they know
from the street or residents with whom they have had sexual encounters while in prison.
Residents must be careful when selecting those to whom they express themselves since the
wrong choice could lead to a confrontation with a staff member and punishment for engaging in prohibited forms of dialogue. Sarah reported not talking to anyone for the first two
months she was in the program:
That statement the counselors always say, Theres no friends in treatment, is true.
You cant trust no one cause the stakes are so high. But you gotta talk, gotta express
yourself; otherwise youd go crazy-youd lose yourself here. But you got to be real
careful. The first person I talked to was a friend of my moms. She didnt report me, and
we began talking to some other residents in here that think this staff is full of shit.. ..
Such interactions also serve as a vehicle which residents can use in protective practices that
differentiate the self from the addict label. Consider, for example, the following exchange
between two residents:
Lisa: They [the staff] told me I was a selfish person and thats because of my
addiction. They said I just prostituted myself to get drugs, but thats not
right; I had to do it for my kids, to support my kids. I dont know why
they would tell me that. I worked real hard to make sure my kids had good
clothes and a home and good food.. ..
Sher: You not selfish; its more like you was selfless! I dont know many girls
that sell their butts on the street to be selfish. What are they getting from
that? Drugs? Shit, that aint nothing. Youre a good person. No addiction
didnt make you selfish; they [staff] got it all wrong!
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In critical spaces, residents sort out competing identity claims and have a forum to
express what they perceive as aspects of their real self. However, their audiences can be
critical, as they do not always accept a residents protestations that her negative behavior
or attitude was motivated by some larger good. Indeed, they often ask why a resident thinks
the staffs attack on her behavior was unwarranted and quiz her on what type of behavioral
critique would have been more applicable.
Organized Resistance
Residents develop critical space to express doubts regarding the staffs assessments of
their identities and to defend their own definitions of self. In defending the self, however,
residents must engage in acts of resistance as a form of self-articulation. Breaking the rules
(or in some other way subtly resisting program guidelines and staff dictates) reassures residents that they retain the capacity to organize their actions and identities. Engaging in
identity protection strategies by expressing ones real self to others is usually combined
with outright resistance strategies to challenge (either publicly or privately) the identity
claims and constructions of self issued by staff.
Within the bounds of critical space, then, a variety of planning sessions emerge which
are intended to accomplish one or more of the following: (1) provide residents with strategies that will allow them to advance through the program without surrendering to organizational identity claims, (2) enable residents to subvert staff control and rebel against
program dictates or staff orders, and (3) assist residents who have a desire to drop out of
PRW and return to the general prison population. This is the forum in which resistance
strategies are planned and often carried out. Such sessions often merge with discussions of
self and the struggle to protect ones image of self from being overrun with identities
imposed by staff. The theme of most of these discussions involves not surrendering to the
process. When I asked an older resident why she resisted the process, she gave the following response:
Its, the process, is their [staff] view of you. Its like youre supposed to accept the fact
youre an addict and all that goes along with it. Basically, you stop thinking for yourself
and just become a nobody-you know, someone who cant think, they just do what
everyone tells em.
Residents use critical space not only to sort out identity claims, but also to devise means
to ensure that they are not surrendering their definitions of self to the therapeutic process.
The most prominent method of doing so is through a process of rule-breaking. When I
asked Nika why she risked serving additional time to give her urine to the resident accused
of snorting heroin-a women she barely knew-she offered the following explanation:
I did it to show my support for her and to jam them [staff]. Everyday they want you to
bow down, degrade yourself, well, they say surrender. I did this because theres only
so far you can degrade a person before she either breaks or rebels. Right now, Im rebelling for myself. I did this, and now she and I both know that they havent got me.
Theres still a part of me that wants to fight in here.
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Thus, rule-breaking often serves as a reminder to residents that they have not surrendered
their real selves and is a signal to their compatriots that they have not yet given in. Rulebreaking of this kind often occurs among more experienced residents who know better
than to violate a particular rule. This type of rule-breaking serves to demonstrate to the resident that, despite the profusion of rules and controls over her body, she still retains the
capacity to act as she decides. Consider the following comment from a resident who left the
program:
Why did I get into a fight? I got into it because I still could. You know what I mean? I
mean I did it because I rememberedthat I still am in charge of me-no matter what they
say. Theyre getting paid for playing a game. And I dont think its fair.. ..I went into the
privacy of my own room. They told me I had a psychological problem and thats why I
had a bad attitude.... I went in my room and this is what I said: I said, Fuck you, all
right? Dont come near my room. Counselor starts and I said, Get the fuck away from
my door. And inmates started coming in my room, and I said, Come in my door one
more time and Im gonna pick up a charge. She [another resident] walked in and I hit
her. I dont care what the consequences were, I did it because they couldnt stop me.
Many residents go to great lengths to break rules because they interpret the process as
something that can transform their identities without their explicit awareness. Indeed,
many residents describe PRW treatment as brainwashing and mind control.
In addition, rule-breaking as a form of resistance is central to sustaining alliances among
residents since it serves as an identifying mechanism for those persons who can be trusted
to keep a secret. This is particularly important since the central strategy for resisting the
process and maintaining ones own sense of self is faking it to make it. For residents who
cannot drop out of the program, the only way to avoid surrender is faking their way through
the program. Residents who are faking it are generally more experienced and have learned
not to react to admonitions from staff members.
Finally, resisting the pressure to surrender may also be achieved through direct subversion of program structure. This is a less frequent form of resistance since it involves extensive planning, cohesion, and trust among peers (all of which are hard to maintain in this
environment). Usually, subversion involves smuggling contraband into the unit. Contraband items are generally innocuous (e.g., candy, soft drinks, and letters), but on at least one
occasion, four bags of heroin were smuggled into the facility. Subversion can also involve
transforming the structure of the program. In extreme cases, residents have staged outright
rebellions. For example, one group of residents used violence to express their discontent
with the program staff. This incident occurred after a resident who wanted to leave the program, but was repeatedly denied transfer, staged a fight with another resident interested in
leaving. Both women were immediately remanded to another unit in the facility, and PRW
residents were threatened with lockdown. Several women began fighting in protest, resulting in immediate lockdown of the PRW unit.
By organizing action, the construction of critical space generates modes of self-expression for residents. Producing critical space enables residents to interpret their experiences
through alternate conceptual categories and provides them with a mode of self-expression.
Since residents are precluded from expressing themselves through language, demeanor,
appearance, or conduct, they develop creative ways to break the rules as a means of con-
247
firming their own definitions of self and strengthening their resistance to claims from the
staff.
BEYOND THE WALLS?

CRITICAL SPACE IN EVERYDAY LIFE
It is ironic that a metaphoric crackhouse enjoys a lively existence within the walls of PRW.
Here is an institutional setting where little has been left to chance. The arrangement of
space, movement, interpersonal relations, interactions, and even vocabulary is assiduously
monitored and regulated for the purposes of transforming the addict self. Yet, in the midst
of it all, the crackhouse endures, despite being one of the most significant markers of the
residents pre-institutional definition of self. The greater irony, however, is not that a fractious weed has sprung up through a crack in the wall, but that this seeming aberration is
actually a product of the organizational structure itself. Indeed, by making therapy focus on
the control of identity and simultaneously denying residents the opportunity to participate
in the construction of a respectable self-image, the program generates resistance activities
which seriously undermine not just the legitimacy of organizational identity claims, but the
rhetoric of rehabilitation more generally. For PRW residents, going to the crackhouse is not
about putting a positive spin on drug use or even denying their involvement with drugs and
crime; rather, it is about protecting a fragile view of themselves as respectable, well-intentioned persons. Given the staffs theories regarding addiction, this view is only defensible
if the integrity of the entire organization-that is, the program itself-an
be called into
question.
The construction of critical space refers to a process through which residents question
PRWs claims about therapy and the addict identity, thereby defending their pre-institutional definitions of self. Their success is accomplished by exploiting weaknesses in the
institutional order to acquire a location, an audience, and a set of discourses which allow
them to present images of self that are otherwise prohibited within PRW. As an analytic
category, critical space has at least four properties that deserve mention here. First, critical
space is one form of resistance to organizational controls and identity claims. It is a space
that is both actively and covertly produced by residents and, as such, should not be confused with spaces that are the result of either overt or covert negotiations between staff and
residents. It is not a mesostructural feature of formal organization in the traditional sense
because it is not a product of negotiation (see Thomas 1984; Maines 1982); it is, instead, a
resident-initiated subversion of formal structure. Indeed, unlike informal agreements
between staff and residents that extend the legitimacy of staff authority (Strauss 1978),
critical space decreases legitimacy and produces challenges to institutional authority.
Second, at the heart of critical space is the interaction that occurs among the residents.
By means of these prohibited encounters, residents generate alternate conceptual frameworks which challenge the therapeutic discourse and allow them to interpret their life experiences in a way that sustains alternate definitions of self. They buttress these definitions of
self with forms of resistance that are designed to distinguish them as individuals from the
organizational construction of addicts. And while the enactment of self-claims in the form
248
of rule-breaking and other sorts of subversive behavior is used by the staff to legitimize
their original claims about the immoral character of addicts, these performances are actually staged for the benefit of another audience with different implications entirely. This
audience is comprised of the same persons with whom the performer has spoken previously concerning the falseness of organizational identity claims and with whom she shares
a critical framework for interpreting experience both inside and outside of the program.
Their reaction to the performance has considerably greater influence over how the actor
ultimately defines herself than does the reaction of the staff.
Third, critical space has a temporal dimension. It can transpire as a brief encounter
between two residents or it can be pursued over the course of several weeks by a number of
residents. Its longevity is determined by the efficacy of institutional efforts at social control
and, relatedly, the availability of other residents who are sympathetic to conceptual frameworks which challenge therapeutic discourses. For example, when the ratio of senior residents to new residents is very high, resistance activities and claims-making sessions can
occur over longer periods and involve greater numbers of persons since experienced residents are more adept at exploiting lapses in the control structure and are more aware of
whom they can trust. The greater the number of new or incoming residents to the program,
the more tenuous the existence of critical space becomes since new residents have little
knowledge about the program structure or how to exploit it, and they are the most likely to
report subversive activities to the staff.
Fourth, critical space is not a uniform feature of institutional life and is not necessarily
connected to a specific physical area. It expands and contracts in response to variation in
the pervasiveness of surveillance and the efficiency of the authority structure. In fact, its
very existence is dependent on lapses in the formal organizational structure. When mechanisms of social control are ubiquitous and residents perceive that they are under constant
surveillance, critical space is virtually non-existent. Without access to critical space, it is
difficult if not impossible for residents to articulate a definition of self that is distinct from
PRWs construction of the addict. Nevertheless, as with any institution that holds individuals against their will, periods of total control are rare (Wrong 1988). The demands of
paperwork, for example, may force staff into their offices, thereby decreasing their capacity to oversee resident behavior.
The concept of critical space and the implication that even the most tightly controlled of
interaction orders is subject to subversion begs the question of the applicability of this concept to everyday life. Is critical space a general aspect of interpersonal relations and, if so,
in what way? These questions require us to consider the structure of interpersonal relations
and ascertain whether the constraints imposed by various identities and relationships are
comparable to the efforts of total institutions to induce a transformation of the self. Such
considerations are best left to future research. However, within the space remaining, I will
outline the case for an investigation of critical space in everyday life.
Without minimizing the intensity of organizational demands on identity or the sheer lack
of resources available to sustain a pre-existent self in programs such as PRW, I am inclined
to suggest that there are instances in everyday life which mimic processes of identity transformation and resistance in total institutions. Indeed, given the dialectical relationship
249
between ones personal sense of self and the expectations of others, it is quite plausible that
individuals, in the course of their everyday lives, construct critical spaces in an effort to
distance themselves from the constraints or imputations certain identities pose for their personal sense of self. This is certainly the case in Horowitzs (1995) study of teen mothers. In
reaction to the demands that families, social workers, and children place on them to
become more self-sacrificing and responsible, the teens tell dramatic stories of parties,
fights, and romance in an effort to demonstrate to one another that a vibrant, impulsive self
exists alongside their identities as mothers. The stories and the oftentimes illicit participation in typical teenage activity reflect their ambivalence toward their new identities as
mothers, and their desire to express a self that is distinct from the identity claims associated
with motherhood.
It is important to emphasize that the construction of critical space is not synonymous
with Goffmans (1961b) role distance, although these two concepts are complementary.
They can be distinguished from one another according to two factors: (1) the location of the
performance and (2) the circumstances which give rise to it. Like critical space, role distance involves a denial of the self that is implied by playing a particular role (as in the case
of the bright student who arrives late, rolls her eyes in class, and pretends that she has not
kept up with assigned work in an effort to avoid being seen by her classmates as a nerd).
However, role distance involves public displays of disaffiliation, while critical space
involves claims and conduct not meant to be witnessed by the audience at issue. An example of the latter would be the case of a disaffected spouse who, in the presence of his wife
and children, may embrace the role of husband, but, in private moments and inconspicuous
places with sympathetic friends, critiques his marriage as well as the implications of this
relationship for his sense of self.
In fact, the concept of critical space assumes that there is perceived necessity driving
actors to publicly embrace a role. The perceived necessity is derived from the actors
expectations that failing to sustain a particular role or identity will result in profoundly negative consequences. This is typically the case in relationships marked by extreme hierarchy, where the individuals access to certain kinds of resources is tied to a mandated
presentation of self despite the fact that the presentation is at odds with how the performer
views himself or herself (e.g., a gay teen who remains closeted to his or her parents to avoid
sanctions of one kind or another). Indeed, the circumstances that give rise to critical space
follow from power imbalances in a relationship, which precludes an individual from negotiating a role or identity that is more in line with his or her conception of self. It will be
recalled that the construction of critical space implies the absence of possibilities for negotiation, since its enactment involves subversion rather than the mediation of formal structure. In everyday life, then, critical spaces are those that are stolen, not borrowed.
In conclusion, the concept of critical space serves as a testament not simply to the capacity of actors to confront their world as stance-taking entities, but to the ability of actors to
creatively mobilize key features of the interaction order (space, audiences, meaning systems) to define and articulate enduring features of the core self as they envision it. This ethnography of PRW has demonstrated that, in organizational and interpersonal contexts
which preclude the construction of respectable self-images, individuals seek alternate
250
Symbolic lnteraction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998
means to resist the identity demands of others, and to creatively manage and develop their
own definitions of self. It is clear that resistance, whether temporary or sustained, successful or failed, is central to how actors maintain their sense of self in environments committed to radical self-uansformation.
Acknowledgment: I am grateful to Ruth Horowitz, Ronnie Steinberg, Jim Thomas,

Michael Flaherty, Heather Smith, Brad Mellinger, and the anonymous reviewers of this
article for their invaluable comments. Thanks also must go to the women of PRW who
allowed me into the turbulence of their world and provided me with their own complex
analyses of social interaction and power. An earlier version of this paper was presented at
the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association, New York City, August
1996.
NOTES
I.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Pseudonyms are used in place of actual names to ensure anonymity. In addition, the use of identifying information is avoided.
In their study, the production of post-graduation identities is bounded only by historical identity
(who the actor was during high school) and the actors own efforts to align his or her inner identity with a publicly enacted self. The threat of being exposed as inauthentic was minor at best, as
the organization of the reunion and fragmented networks of peers did not operate as an effective
surveillance mechanism.
The program has not yet released information regarding relapse and recidivism rates among program graduates following their release from prison.
When I was sanctioned, it tended to be for fairly minor violations, such as failing to push in my
chair after leaving the table, talking out of turn, or failing to announce my departure from the
unit. Since I was not a resident, I was subject only to public censure as the sanction for rule violations and not other common types of punishment, such as loss of telephone privileges, mandatory cleaning requirements, and the like.
Interviews with the latter group were similar in content to those with the former set of counselors, but they did not include questions about the programs origin.
The disease model is itself influenced by certain moral categories related to illicit drug use (see,
for example, Neuhaus 1993; Poikolainen 1982).
My presence as a researcher in the facility furthered the production of critical space as the
women were guaranteed confidentiality in my conversations and interviews with them. Frequently, the interviews were used by residents to articulate definitions of self and express doubt
about the program without fear that staff or other residents would gain knowledge of them.
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Going to the Crackhouse: Critical Space as a Form of Resistance in Total Institutions and

Going to the Crackhouse:

JillMcCorkel, Department of Sociology, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115-2854.

Symbolic Interaction 21 (3): 227-252

Copyright 0 1998 by JAl Press Inc.

All rights of reproductionin any form reserved.

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Going to the Crackhouse

THE FLAWEDSELF IN THE TOTAL INSTITUTION

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

ment to the organization, as well as to organizational claims, is variable. Individuals never

Going to the Crackhouse

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Going to the Crackhouse

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Going to the Crackhouse

BREAKING D O W N THE ADDICT

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Control of the Physical Self

Going to the Crackhouse

Control of Conceptual Categories

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3,1998

THE DEPLOYMENT OF PUBLIC SPACE

Going to the Crackhouse

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

DEFENDING THE SELF:

Going to the Crackhouse

Questioning Identity Claims:

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Going to the Crackhouse

Going to the Crackhouse

Constructing Critical Space

Symbolic interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

The development of alternative sets of interpretations is frequently accomplished through

Going to the Crackhouse

Symbolic interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Going to the Crackhouse

BEYOND THE WALLS?

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Going to the Crackhouse

Symbolic lnteraction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

Acknowledgment: I am grateful to Ruth Horowitz, Ronnie Steinberg, Jim Thomas,

Going to the Crackhouse

Symbolic Interaction Volume 21, Number 3, 1998

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