ABSTRACT

This chapter explores qualitative research oil the experiences of women awaiting trial in bail hostels. It examines use of qualitative research techniques to develop an appreciation of women's lives, and particularly the themes of power, control and the gendered body. For individual women, the use of substances exposes them to the surveillance and control of individuals and agencies such as criminal justice professionals, therapists, counsellors, social workers and psychiatrists. Traditional explanations of women's use of illegal drags and alcohol have often employed a deviance model to explain women's use of the substances. Women's uses of substances are thus linked with patriarchal pain and 'the distressing ordeals which women experience both publicly and privately in the gendered system of domination'. The chapter demonstrates that a sociological understanding of women's experiences of embodiment may be further enhanced by empirical qualitative research which exposes the relationship between women's bodies and society, incorporating recent developments within the sociology of the body and feminist thought.