What I Learned from my Shawshank Presentation

      My Shawshank Redemption and Rita Hayworth project was about Solitary Confinement. I worked with Julia and HanVit. It was a really interesting topic because I didn't really know much about it, just that one is alone in a room with little to no contact with anyone. It's pretty much just that, but there's more to it: a lot of psychological damage can be done. I always imagined the Security Housing Units, or SHUs, as dark, dank, and dreadful; and they definitely used to be (it's nicknamed "the hole,") but now they are bright, white rooms that have an eerie, sterile feeling. According to the Center for Constitutional Rights, the psychological repercussions are similar. I think that when you can't talk to anyone, you're going to be thinking a lot, and probably feeling a lot of emotions, like anger or sadness. Suicides are most common in the SHU.          
     This helped me understand the novella better because I realized that how horrible the prisoners feel about going in there. A lot of the prisoners that go in are not the same when they come out. Some are different though, like Andy, a character in the novella. Red, the narrator of the novella, says that he doesn't "think solitary was the hardship for Andy that it was for some men. He got along with himself" (King 36). Doing this project helped me realize that freedom and time are a privilege that should not be taken for granted.