Royal College of Physicians and University of Central Lancashire<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This paper foregrounds the use of creative methodologies to explore the lived experiences of teachers working in complex carceral environments. Prison education presents unique challenges, where the tensions between care and control shape teaching practices and impact both educators and learners. Traditional research methods often struggle to capture the nuances of these spaces, particularly the affective dimensions of prison teaching that influence engagement, learning, and hope. By employing innovative, arts-based approaches, this study aims to offer insights into how educators navigate and make sense of their roles within these constrained environments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Building on feminist new materialist perspectives (Barad, 2007; Haraway, 2016) and arts-based methodologies, this study examines how prison teachers navigate and make sense of their educational roles. A walking methodology (Springgay & Truman, 2019) conducted within a Category B male prison, facilitated embodied engagement with the teaching environment, attuning to ambient sounds and spatial elements that shape pedagogical encounters. Participants were invited to create real-time drawings of these experiences, capturing their immediate affective responses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These visual representations were then used within a Visual Matrix group-based method (Froggett, Manley & Roy, 2018), where teachers collectively generated and shared imaginaries, offering affective insights into the emotional and spatial dimensions of their practice. Textile-making, drawing on Manning\u2019s (2016) work on minor gestures, was also employed as an arts-based analytical approach, allowing for a diffractive reading of the data that materialised the affective intensities of prison teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By foregrounding creative and postqualitative research approaches, this study highlights the transformative potential of education in prison spaces, offering new insights into teacher experience, professional identity, and pedagogical innovation. The findings contribute to broader discussions on how education can foster hope, resilience, and improved life chances within the prison system and beyond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
References<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Barad, K. (2007) Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Froggett, L., Manley, J. and Roy, A. (2018) ‘The Visual Matrix Method: Imagery and Affect in a Group-Based Research Setting’, Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung \/ Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 19(3). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.17169\/fqs-16.3.2308<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Haraway, D. J. (2016) Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Manning, E. (2016) The Minor Gesture. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Springgay, S. and Truman, S. E. (2019) Walking Methodologies in a More-than-Human World: WalkingLab. London: Routledge. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.4324\/9781315231914<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Lucy Harding’s ResearchGate page<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n