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Pecking orders

Power relationships and gender in Australian prison graffiti

University of Ballarat, Australia, jz.wilson{at}ballarat.edu.au

The article examines male and female inmate graffiti in a decommissioned Australian jail, a holding facility attached to the former Melbourne Magistrates Court. While male graffitists were preoccupied chiefly with personal identity, power and vengeance, the women used graffiti to build networks and alliances in order to cope with life inside. Their social structure, as expressed in the graffiti, is unusual in that, unlike the men, virtually all female inmates expected to be sent to one prison upon conviction; they thus treated the jail as a staging-ground for their arrival and continued survival in the main prison. Further aspects of the general condition of female inmates in the late 20th-century prison system are discussed. The article begins with observations on the political implications of attempting such research, and consequent tendencies for vulnerable historical voices to be silenced through regimes of de facto censorship.

Key Words: prison • women • gender • deviance • graffiti • censorship • Australian prisons • hate writings

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