ABSTRACT
This chapter builds on the psycho-social deprivations of imprisonment and the significance of sub rosa inmate norms for the guidance of conduct for the female as a prison inmate. It broadens this view to include pre-prison criminal history, and the distinctive sex role of women in American society. The inmates at Frontera respond to the experience of imprisonment not only because they are reacting to deprivations and restrictions, but also because they have internalized, to varying degrees, the values of delinquent subcultures, of prisoner codes, and of the conventional community; and finally, they react as women. The chapter describes the criminal and penal careers of our population, compares these experiences with those of male prisoners, and then discusses some of the implications of the most important latent identity-sex role-in accounting for differences in male and female inmate behavior.
