Imprisoning Intimacy: The Expanding Sites of Racialized-Gendered Carceral Violence

Abstract

This study conceptualizes carceral violence to include the intimate sphere, highlighting a form of systemic racialized-gendered violence I term intimate carceral violence, which consists of two distinct violent effects of carcerality on relationships in Black communities: prisonized romance and coercive carceral care. I conducted qualitative interviews with 31 criminal-legal system–impacted Black women aged between 18 and 65 years in Southern California. Findings revealed that their romantic precarity included the challenge of finding partners due to the encroachment of the carceral state on Black communities. This study establishes how women engage in intimate carceral labor to mitigate their experiences of intimate carceral violence. I focus on the hidden work of managing an intimate partner’s emotions and behavior engendered by incarceration.