Textiles are made by incarcerated individuals for a number of reasons. Some are the result of forced labour, others represent a hobby or pastime, and a third group are produced covertly to carry communication within or beyond the prison or workhouse walls. This lecture looks for traces of emotions in these historical textiles that are less commonly associated with textiles, and less commonly associated with women, such as disagreement, anger or frustration. Is it ever really possible to sense the embodied lives of these textiles’ makers? And why are textiles, in particular, a recurring material of choice for redemptive labour?

keynote lecture for "Mending Histories, Stitching Futures" at the Faculty of Geography and History, University of Barcelona, March 18, 2026