- This article deals with the practice of "detention" as a punishment for students. For information on Immigration detention, please see the article under that name.
In middle school and high school, detention very specifically refers to a period after the end of the school day (or, rarely, on a non-school day) when students who have misbehaved must remain in a designated classroom as punishment for their misbehavior. Detention is usually the mildest form of punishment available to a high school, followed in severity by suspension and expulsion. Generally, detention is carried out in a room that offers no amenities, so that students serving detention will have no outlet to distract them from their punishment. The students are usually monitered by a teacher, and may be required to perform some punitive task, such as clapping blackboard erasers, writing an essay, or repeatedly writing some admonishment on the blackboard.
There are numerous pop culture references to the practice of detention. For example, the opening credits to the Simpsons show Bart Simpson in detention, repeatedly writing some ironic phrase along the lines of "I will not instigate revolution", "I do not have diplomatic immunity", or "I will not waste chalk".
Detention was also the name of an animated series that had a brief run on the WB in 1999 and 2000.[1] The series portrayed a group of misfit middle-schoolers who were constantly in detention, and scheming to overcome the obstacles that said condition presented.
The entire movie, The Breakfast Club revolves around five disparate students bonding during a day in detention. The movie Some Kind of Wonderful features a significant detention twist - a student intentionally misbehaves in order to be put in detention with the girl of his dreams - but later learns that she has managed to talk her way out of the punishment. However, the student ends up befriending the dangerous-looking derilicts who are regularly on detention, and they ultimately help him out in his moment of greatest need.
Other forms of detention
Detention generally refers to the holding of a person, either as punishment for a wrong, or as a precautionary measure while investigating a potential threat posed by that person. The term can also be used in reference to the holding of property, for the same reasons.
Any form of imprisonment can be called detention, although the term is associated with persons who are being held temporarily without having been charged with a crime. For example, the alleged Taliban supporters captured in the 2001 United States invasion of Afghanistan have never been classified as "prisoners" by the U.S. government, but have consistantly been referred to as "detainees", suggesting that they are only being held temporarily while their status is investigated.