While the criminological literature has devoted great attention towards examining prison programs and interventions, the research has largely overlooked arts-based initiatives within prison. To gain an understanding of the impact that prison theatre has on the lives of criminalized individuals, this thesis represents a case study on Canada’s only inmate-run prison theatre, William Head on Stage (WHoS). Through qualitative interviews with 15 incarcerated WHoS participants and 6 former WHoS participants, this study explores the experiences of individuals with this long-standing theatre initiative. By implementing an integrative conceptual framework that captures the prison backdrop to which prison theatre operates, this study draws on Goffman’s (1961) total institutions as well as conceptual understandings around the prison culture (Ricciardelli, 2015; 2014b). Through the analysis of the participants’ experiences, the emerging themes in this study collectively reveal how the impacts of WHoS stem from the contrasting nature of prison theatre to both the structural and social systems of prison. While this research study helps substantiate the significance of arts-based initiatives like WHoS, it also helps bridge the gap within the literature between the arts and criminology.

This dissertation explores the effects of a Prison Theatre project conducted at the Youth Centre at Westville Correctional Centre in 2010. It explores the relationship between change and increased levels of Social Capital that staff and offenders attribute to the performances. The centre houses male offenders between the ages of 18 and 25. The project was of particular interest because it involved offenders, correctional staff and management. The plays were made using a problem-posing methodology that involved the audience in proposing solutions. These were documented and circulated to management, staff, and offenders. The plays addressed three topics. The first topic was chosen by the cast, and the other two topics were chosen by the management. The topics were: Increasing self-esteem in the Youth Centre (Chosen by offenders); No smoking policy (Chosen by management); Sexual assault (Chosen by management). I interviewed the cast, a sample of the audience, and correctional staff and managers. The data was analysed in terms of levels and elements of Social Capital (Putnam, 1995) and included Negative Social Capital. I have not found other examples of research in the field of Prison Theatre that have made use of concepts related to Social Capital to analyse the impact of theatre projects. This research therefore establishes a new area of focus for the field of Prison Theatre. The findings proved that the theatre project was an effective means of increasing communication between members of different gangs and between correctional staff and offenders in a non-threatening manner. This provided opportunities for changes in relations of power and increased problem solving in the correctional environment. As a result two systemic changes occurred. The staff provided feedback on offenders‟ requests and complaints and designated smoking areas were created. The findings demonstrate how notions of Social Capital can explain how theatre affects change in a correctional context because it focuses on social dynamics rather than systemic issues. This is important in a correctional environment where offender‟s ability to effect systemic change is limited. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2011.

Ce travail s’ancre dans une démarche compréhensive des expériences individuelles du quotidien carcéral. De nombreux entretiens semi-directifs réalisés auprès de différents acteurs des prisons (personnes détenues, personnels de surveillance, CPIP, membres de la direction) constituent les principales références et sources de cette recherche ; c’est en cela qu’ils sont présentés et donnés à lire au même titre que le développement qu’ils nourrissent. Cette enquête tend à comprendre et à montrer que, si la prison a des conséquences désocialisantes et désaffliantes pour les personnes détenues, le drame social de la prison se joue avant tout dans les nouvelles formes de sociabilité qu’elle induit. Le concept de « théâtre carcéral », fil rouge de ce travail, permet notamment de saisir et de questionner les logiques de « représentation » et de « rôles » (Cf. Erving Goffman) qui sont au cœur des interactions entre les différents acteurs sociaux des prisons ; ces « rôles » sont entendus comme les attentes, les fonctions et les comportements qui sont induits par le statut interne de chaque acteur (qu’il soit CPIP, surveillant ou «détenu»). Malgré des micro « sorties de rôles » et l’existence de nombreuses pratiques d’entraide et de convivialité en détention, les logiques interactionnelles du « théâtre carcéral » restreignent les formes de « présentation de soi » de chaque acteur aux yeux des autres, et dévoilent une appréhension généralisée de la relation à l’autre comme un risque. Ce travail pose l’art, dans le cadre d’expériences artistiques collectives, comme possibilité de sortir du « théâtre carcéral » pour les personnes détenues, et de (re)créer du « commun » à l’intérieur de la détention, mais aussi entre l’intérieur des prisons et l’extérieur. Cette proposition est illustrée par l’expérience-exposition « Des traces et des Hommes. Imaginaires du château de Selles », réalisée au CD de Bapaume à l’initiative du musée des beaux-arts de Cambrai en 2016. Il s’agit de montrer que les expériences artistiques se distinguent d’autres activités proposées en détention, dans la mesure où elles permettent aux personnes de construire un interstice dans lequel explorer des possibilités de vie (ensemble), et de se (re)connaître dans l’expression créative de leurs individualités ; l’engagement individuel au sein d’un collectif peut en cela changer la donne en termes de rapport à l’autre, en détention d’abord puis dans la perspective de la sortie de prison. / This investigation is based on a comprehensive approach to individual experiences of prison. The methodology includes many semi-structured interviews with various social actors in prison (inmates and prison administration staff). These testimonies are presented as part of the analysis. The purpose of this investigation is to demonstrate that the experience of prison involves generating new forms of sociability, in addition to having “de-socialising” and “disaffiliating” consequences for detained people. The concept of “prison theatre” is an interesting guideline for understanding the logics of “representation” and “roles” that are at the centre of social interactions in prison (Cf. Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical analysis approach). The potency of the established and expected “roles” in prison (as “inmate” or as “prison guard” for example) reduces the forms of “presentation of Self” and of socialization among the different social actors in prison. This work proposes collective arts experiences as a way out of the “prison theatre” for detained people and as an opportunity to create a common living world inside the prison and between “inside” and “outside”. Such a proposition is illustrated by the experience-exhibition “Traces and Humans: imaginations of the castle of Selles” initiated in 2016 by the Museum of Cambrai in the prison of Bapaume. This experience raises the power of art as a universal language which allows the possibility for inmates to express themselves inside the prison, to have contact with the “outside world” and to feel like they are still taking part in the society.