The sociological imagination (SI) has been an important framework relied upon by the field of sociology. This paper intertwines the SI with reflexive narrative to illuminate insight into the carceral experience from the perspective of an incarcerated person. Combining reflexive practice and drawing on various sociological principles, it delves deeply into the emotions, concerns, context in how the prison system fails incarcerated people. Interrogating various themes including, employment, homosexuality in prisons, and the underlying social misconceptions of the utility of prisons; It spotlights the realities of people under the care and control of the correctional system by drawing on autoethnography, theory and empirical evidence. The use of the SI in elaborating upon the carceral experience provides a more intimate approach not otherwise explored in the traditional modes of criminological inquiry, adding an important person-centred dimension to the analysis of the carceral experience.

Prisons worldwide, including in Australia, are segregated based on biological sex. On the other hand, feminist scholarship challenges gender within the binary of man and woman, arguing instead that individuals undergo the process of "becoming" and are not merely born. In this space, tensions exist for transgender individuals interacting with prisons. Although many policy initiatives are being established by correctional authorities world-wide, these innovations are often criticized for failing to translate into reality. It is argued here that prisons must reimagine the way they categorize individuals based on binary conceptions of gender. Instead, they must view gender through the optics of transgenderism, where it is conceived as something fl uid, changing, and mutable.