THE COMPARATIVE STUDY OF PRISON LIFE IN THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION AND THE STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.29121/granthaalayah.v13.i13(4ISMER).2025.6049Keywords:
Imprisonment, Power Dynamics, Prison Culture, Prison Literature, Punitive NatureAbstract [English]
Prison Literature is a widening area of study in Literature. The works mainly talk about prison, jail, or any confinement. This paper explores the concept of prison, and how it confines and resists the mind and body of an individual. The paper uses a comparative study to analyse ‘Shawshank Redemption’, a prison movie, and ‘Stanford Prison Experiment’, a real-life prison study using Prison Literature as the theoretical framework. The researcher aims to explore how the prison institutionalizes the prisoners internally and externally, how the characters resist or conform to the confinement, and the prison culture, power dynamics, and punitive nature. The main focus, of this paper, is on how people react to confinement.
Downloads
References
Darabont, F. (Director). (1994). The Shawshank Redemption [Motion Picture]. United States: Columbia Pictures.
Goomany, A., & Dickinson, T. (2015). The Impact of Prison Climate on Mental Health. Journal of Forensic Psychology Practice, 15 (3), 257–275.
Kelsey, J., & Esther, P. (2018). The Architecture of an Ethical Prison. Journal of Correctional Education, 69 (2), 6–23.
King, S. (1982). Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption. In Different Seasons (pp. 1–119).
Stanford University. (2025). The Stanford Prison Experiment.
Sullivan, R. (2017). Representing the Incarcerated: Nineties Hollywood Cinema and the Prison Film. Film Quarterly, 71 (2), 14–25.
Wikipedia contributors. (2025). Prison Literature. Wikipedia. Retrieved 2025,January
Zimbardo, P. G. (1971). The Stanford Prison Experiment. Stanford University.
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2025 Ahla K. I, B. Sonia Chellirian
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
With the licence CC-BY, authors retain the copyright, allowing anyone to download, reuse, re-print, modify, distribute, and/or copy their contribution. The work must be properly attributed to its author.
It is not necessary to ask for further permission from the author or journal board.
This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.
