The experience of imprisonment is an experience of powerlessness. Prisoners get to control almost nothing about their lives. Many turn to creative pastimes as a way to escape, to pass the time and to reassert control over a part of their lives. Prisoners may build with matchsticks, write or draw. When I was a prisoner my pastime of choice was Warhammer. I spent hours assembling and painting armies in the quiet, confined space of my cell. This ethnographic study explores the experience of Warhammer within prison, and how the meaning of the hobby changed for me as a result. It explores the practical and emotional differences of the hobby behind bars, and also the layers of meaning which I now ascribe to Warhammer.
Author bio
David Shipley is a former prisoner, a writer, a public speaker and an academic. He is researching personal narratives in the context of parental imprisonment at the University of Southampton.
Video recording
