Deviant Femininities: The Everyday Making and Unmaking of ‘Criminal’ Youth

Abstract

This chapter presents an insight into some of the ways in which young people who have been convicted of criminal offences become essentialised as ‘deviant’ through media discourses and the reiterative practices of others in everyday life. It discusses how a group of young women aged 17–25, who have, by their own definition, been ‘involved’ in the youth justice system, are conceived, imagined and understood both within and outside their local neighbourhood. Using their own words and frameworks of understanding, the chapter demonstrates how these young bodies are both emotionally and metaphorically marked, recognised and categorised. Their narratives reveal the way they (often feel they have to) dress; the way they (sometimes feel they have to) ‘carry’ themselves; the people they (can be forced to) associate with — all have significant impacts on how they are perceived and identified on an everyday basis. To my reading, there are a number of fractions which, taken together, work to stigmatise them as a group. Their bodies are read as ‘risky’ and, as a consequence, their actions and daily movements can be misunderstood and misinterpreted. ‘Youth’ as a problem for society is the dominant discourse evoked here, and the chapter adds to existing literature on constructing youthful bodies as ‘deviant’ (Jenks 1996, Griffin 2001, Little and Leyshon 2003, Hörschelmann 2005), by arguing that this is part of a multidimensional process of making and manufacturing social class.