ABSTRACT
The incarceration of women in Aotearoa New Zealand, mirroring a global picture, has seen a large and disproportionate increase compared with increases in men’s prison populations. Although it is widely accepted that prisons and prison experiences are gendered, prison literature has continued to be overly focused on men’s prisons. The first section of this chapter will explore shifting trends and discourses in women’s imprisonment in Aotearoa New Zealand through a summary of the extant historical literature from the early years of colonisation to the post-war era. The second section will trace shifting themes and discourses in selected documents from the 1960s to the 2000s. This chapter will provide an overview of how developments in both policy and in understandings of crime and gender have impacted on women in Aotearoa New Zealand prisons. Moreover, the chapter will elucidate the ways in which women’s prisons in Aotearoa New Zealand are gender-making institutions, disciplining women to produce specific embodied outcomes. The desired outcomes for the women under the control of corrections have evolved in line with shifting institutional discourses and idealised gender norms.
