Stigmatization and prisoners' wives' feelings of shame

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Abstract
This paper examines the extent to which incarcerated husbands' stigma extends to their wives. A combination of sources of data were used to construct an ethnographic account of the experiences of thirty women married to men incarcerated in two prisons. At the time of their husbands' arrest and initial incarceration, wives are likely to report feelings of shame. Findings also show that they are more likely to worry about the possibility of stigmatization within their communities than actually experience it. Although shame and stigmatization are not central issues in wives' everyday lives, these issues are of consequence whenever they visited their husbands at various prisons.

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