Almost Home

For many inmates of the Federal Bureau of Prisons confinement to a halfway house marks both the final stage of the prison experience and the beginning of the post-prison experience. While technically still in the custody of the Bureau of Prisons, inmates are expected to prepare themselves for release from custody while in residence in a halfway house and, the staff of these facilities are expected to aid in that process. I have decided to analyze a particular halfway house and the time inmates spent there within the theoretical concept of 'rite de passage' in order to highlight the transitional nature of both the inmates residing there and of the facility themselves. Before showing how inmates at this facility are best understood as liminal personae, I will first create a general history of halfway houses and then placed them and their use within the Federal Bureau of Prison's within that history. Once halfway houses have been situated within a particular historical context, I then locate this facility within a specific community and set out to provide a description of inmate's lived experiences while residing there.