Research and References

Abstract

The report explains the results of exploratory research into the work of the prison based charity Changing Tunes, which uses music both within and also outside prison with offenders and ex offenders. Evidence revealed that the pro social impact on the participants came as a result both of participation in music and the roles this gave them but also as a result of longevity of the support and mentoring from Changing Tunes staff which continued both inside and outside prison.

Abstract

The report evaluated a series of five-day music projects which took place in eight men's prisons across England from October 2007 to July 2008. The evaluation was aimed at understanding the impact of the project on its participants' engagement with purposeful activities whilst in prison. In particular the impact of the project on their engagement with the Learning and Skills department, as well as their behaviour and general well-being in prison.

This evaluation is based on empirical observation and analysis ofdocumentary data, interviews, focus groups, and survey questionnaires. It is the result of a sustained, in-depth evaluation of the process and outcomes of the music project by researchers from the University of Cambridge's Institute of Criminology.

Abstract

In the Middle Ages there were gaols and dungeons, but punishment was for the most part a spectacle. The economic changes and growing popular dissent of the 18th century made necessary a more systematic control over the individual members of society, and this in effect meant a change from punishment, which chastised the body, to reform, which touched the soul. Foucault shows the development of the Western system of prisons, police organizations, administrative and legal hierarchies for social control - and the growth of disciplinary society as a whole. He also reveals that between school, factories, barracks and hospitals all share a common organization, in which it is possible to control the use of an individual's time and space hour by hour.

Abstract

The goal of this report is to develop a 'logic model' that can account for how Changing Tunes (CT) works as a rehabilitative strategy, outlining both the dynamic processes involved and their immediate/short-term and medium/longer-term impacts on the lives of participants. This analysis identified seven, key elements of the CT process that can account for how the projects "work": A) Participant-led/Sense of Collective Ownership/Responsibility B) Therapeutic Alliance with Facilitator C) Group Bonding and Mutual Support D) Challenging Participants to Test Their Limits E) Public Performance and Acknowledgement F) Praise G) Fostering a Sense of Achievement. Written feedback on CT projects was submitted by 87 participants from 12 different prisons.

Abstract

This thesis looks to investigate the role of music-making in prisons in England and Wales. It investigates within which prisons music-making is available, the styles and genres that are provided, music-making's utility (or lack thereof) to carceral infrastructures, and where it may provide potential resistance to carcerality. Music-making (Cohen and Duncan, 2022) draws from the concept of musicking coined by (Small, 1998) and uses music as a verb, suggesting that music is never purely an aesthetic but always bound in the socialities that surround and create it (Cohen, 2000). The core arguments of the thesis are that in order to gain access to prisons, music-making providers have adjusted their aims to fulfil a blend of medical and opportunity models where criminal behaviour is believed to be a pathology that can only be fixed by providing opportunities for the 'criminal' to change themselves (Kendall, 2000)...