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Prisons and Punishment in Texas

Culture, History and Museological Representation

  • Book
  • © 2016

Overview

Authors:
  1. Hannah Thurston

    1. University of Brighton, United Kingdom

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Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Prisons and Penology (PSIPP)

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Table of contents (14 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-ix
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  2. Introduction

    • Hannah Thurston
    Pages 1-4

  3. Setting the Scene for Museological Research

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 5-5
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    2. The Significance of Stories in Museum Research

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 7-17

    3. Becoming a Texas Tourist

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 19-46

    4. Telling Tales About a ‘Tough Texas’

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 47-65

  4. Representing Punishment in the United States of America

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 67-67
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    2. Emotionality and Cultural Stories of (In)justice

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 69-97

    3. The Cultural Life of Punishment in the Southern States

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 99-118

    4. Narrative Possibilities in Cultural Life Research

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 119-128

  5. The Punishment Museums of the Lone Star State

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 129-129
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    2. Museum Stories of a Distinctly Tough Texas

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 131-146

    3. Depicting Modern Punishment as Civilised Punishment

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 147-170

    4. A Narrative Journey Through Inmate Identities

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 171-180

  6. The Texan Self-identity Past and Present

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 181-181
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    2. ‘Texanicity’ and Its Punishment Dimensions

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 183-195

    3. Texan Toughness and Lone Star Memories: The Alamo and the Old West

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 197-223

    4. Re-imagining Texas as a Place of Harsh Punishment

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 225-238

    5. Epilogue: So Where Do We Go from Here?

      • Hannah Thurston
      Pages 239-241

  7. Back Matter

    Pages 243-249
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Keywords

About this book

This book explores the identity of Texas as a state with a large and severe penal system. It does so by assessing the narratives at work in Texas museums and tourist sites associated with prisons and punishment. In such cultural institutions, complex narratives are presented, which show celebratory stories of Texan toughness in the penal sphere, as well as poignant stories about the witnessing of executions, comical stories that normalize the harsher aspects of Texan punishment, and presentations about prison officers who have lost their lives in the war on crime. In analysing these representations, the book shows that Texan history plays an important role in the production of Texan self-identity, and that to understand the Texan commitment to harsh punishment we must be prepared to focus on Texan myths and memories. 


Prisons and Punishment in Texas draws on diverse interdisciplinary work, including criminology, cultural studies aboutSouthern values, as well as research on cultural memory and dark tourism. Museums are shown to be under-researched sites of criminological significance, which offer rich evidence through which penal imaginaries and the cultural role of punishment can be explored. The book will be of great interest to criminologists as well as scholars of sociology, cultural studies, museum studies and politics.


Authors and Affiliations

  • University of Brighton, United Kingdom

    Hannah Thurston

About the author

Hannah Thurston is Lecturer in Criminology at the University of Brighton, UK. She was awarded her PhD from the University of Kent in 2014. She researches museological representations of both punishment and policing.

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