On the afterlives of incarceration: An interdisciplinary examination of narrative construction at Shrewsbury prison museum, UK

Abstract

This exploratory paper uses cross-disciplinary expertise to interrogate the discourses used in a UK decommissioned prison functioning as a dark touristic destination in 2023: Shrewsbury prison. We use collective insights from media analysis, critical stylistics and criminology to ask how touristic prisons such as this construct true crime, and what place this construction has in the local/national community. In so doing, we highlight the need for spaces of this kind to make better connections between the past and the present, and raise more awareness relating to matters such as prisoner mental health, re-entry and desistance, the conditions of confinement, and its impact on families. Our findings demonstrate the value of an explicitly interdisciplinary approach to dark tourism. Approaching Shrewsbury collectively enabled us to see how narrative construction operates simultaneously at structural, cultural, and linguistic levels. It was only through shared discussion and collective documentation that the nuances of absence, framing, nostalgia, metaphor and agency became visible. Dark tourism sites such as Shrewsbury are not inert heritage spaces but active producers of meaning within contemporary debates about crime and punishment. We seek to encourage further academic involvement in order to improve the educational content that can be embedded and integrated into public-informing tourist provisions, and thus enhance such sites’ potential for visitor education and empowerment