Conclusion

Abstract

In June 2012, the US Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights convened its first hearing on solitary confinement—a practice that apparently is more widespread in the United States than some might imagine; 81,622 prisoners were placed in “restricted housing” in 2005, according to a Bureau of Justice report (Guenther 2012). A range of social workers, psychologists, and former prisoners testified, but I surmise that the testimony tendered by a Vanderbilt University associate professor proved unusual for a congressional hearing. Lisa Guenther approached the issue through the optic of phenomenology, which is a philosophical method