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Dr Nic Aaron

Positions held:
  • Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, School of Social Sciences
  • Overview

    Overview

    Biography

    My research uses a feminist abolitionist approach that sees the end of sexual violence as inextricable from the end of state violence. My current research questions the possibility of a natural death in custodial settings, given the structural violence intrinsic to incarceration (in immigration detention, psychiatric detention, police custody or prison).

  • Research

    Research

    Research interests

    • prison abolition
    • queer theory
    • embodiment
    • crip theory
    • critical race theory
    • reproductive justice
    • disability justice

    Research overview

    My current research considers the connections between medical negligence and death in custody, with a focus on the prisons of England and Wales. Each time someone dies in custody, the cause and circumstances of their death are investigated by a coroner through an inquest process. Proceedings are concluded by identifying a cause of death: among the possible explanations is “natural causes”. However, the definition of a “natural” death lacks clarity: its meaning is thus far surprisingly under-researched and uninterrogated. This research questions the categorisation of “natural” death within the prison system of England and Wales, given the widely documented medical neglect that categorises imprisonment, a punishment targeting people marginalised by racism, classism and ableism. The aim of this project is to critically analyse what is obscured by the categorisation of a “natural” death in custodial settings, calling into question processes that rationalise marking certain bodies as disposable.