ABSTRACT
This is one of two chapters focusing specifically on the programming interventions that are (or aren’t) available to girls inside juvenile detention. The chapter opens with the life-story of a young woman who by her own admission is unable to either understand the sources of or control her aggressive behavior. As is true with other detained girls whose narratives are highlighted in this chapter, Vienna, whose life is organized around violent offending and victimization, is not just a passive victim, but a fighter. A needs and strengths assessment that could tailor an effective treatment for such girls was not only absent, but also incompatible with the dominant view that these young women possessed no real strengths to build on. Trauma-informed therapeutic interventions that targeted the omnipresent violent life-stories of system-involved girls inside juvenile detention were sporadic, temporary, and disorganized. Rather than raising critical consciousness and offering healing, existing therapeutic interventions individualized delinquency and pathologized girls’ agency. Counselors often left girls’ fundamental questions unanswered, while at other times pushed them to accept uncritically a self-image that reflected their own opinions and privileged circumstances.
