Politics of Invisibility: The Violence of Mass Incarceration for the Mentally Ill
Social Sciences
Senior Thesis through the Feminist Studies (FMST195) and Psychology (PSYC195) Departments
Abstract
Across various types of confinement there are now more people with severe mental illness in prisons than in mental hospitals (Horowitz, 2013). The current paper takes up this issue by integrating feminist analysis into current psychological studies on the incarceration of the mentally ill. It argues that the structure of the prison system, specifically the use of solitary confinement, has violent implications for the mentally disabled in how it renders them invisible as an undesirable population while provoking and exacerbating the emergence of mental illness. Chapter one critiques the ideological foundations of both the mental health and prison systems to show how they contribute to the infliction of cruel and unusual punishment on the incarcerated mentally ill. Chapter two discusses, in depth, the violence that occurs at the intersection of these ideologies, looking at how prisons operate as places of “multiple invisibilities” in which undesirable populations like racial minorities, the poor, and, as I will argue, the mentally ill are disappeared (Rhodes, 2004). The third chapter reviews evidence regarding the role of the prison system, and particularly solitary confinement, in exacerbating and causing mental illness within a space where the direct interaction between the system and the individual is most visible. Finally, in the conclusion suggestions are presented for short and long term changes to prison policy.
