Mapping a Process of Negotiated Identity Among Incarcerated Male Juvenile Offenders

Abstract

Building on theories of youth identity transitions, this study maps a process of negotiated identity among incarcerated young men. Data are drawn from ethnographic study of three juvenile correctional institutions and longitudinal semistructured interviews with facility residents. Cross-case analysis of 10 cases that finds youth offenders adapted to the correctional world either with ease or difficulty depending on their professed criminal identifications and their ability to locate a sense of personal power within the institution. Youth also employed a set of strategies to contend with treatment discourses challenging them to reexamine their prior selves and envision alternative future identity possibilities. These strategies shape three identified patterns of identity transition: “self synthesis,” “situational self-transformation,” and “self-preservation.” The findings highlight youths' efforts to retain a positive view of the self in response to challenges to professed identities and reveal various styles of identity transitions occurring in involuntary institutional contexts.