‘It's the little things that matter’: Material culture and adaptation in a local prison

At the centre of this paper is the question of how selves take on durable forms within transient and unpredictable environments. Drawing on material culture studies and Science and Technology Studies, this paper explores the ways in which durable objects and commodities contribute to the construction of stable adaptive states. Drawing on 30 interviews and 9 months of ethnographic observation in a men's local prison, the paper explores the ways in which the properties and use of objects serve as a way of enduring the ‘liminal’ stages of imprisonment. Within the distinctly transient and unpredictable context of the local prison, objects can take on a range of important roles, providing a form of adhesion around which ways of living can be formed.