Structural Functionalism In Prisons

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1. What happened in this film was a by-product of structural functionalism, behavioural psychology and anomic suicide. In structural functionalism, each institution in the society has a specific job or role to play and each role has a status attached to it. This can be presented in the film as the warden has full control of what happens in the prison and order the prison guards (who is below the warden) and the prisoners are below prison guards. There is a lot of corruption in these roles in the movie, the warden was corrupt because no one was there questioning his behaviour so he was able to get away with what he wanted to. The prison guards severely beat the prisons and sometimes killed them and were able to get away with it because they knew …show more content…

Five examples of re-socialization in the film include:
When the prisoners were showered naked and then when they had to walk to their cells naked, this stripped them of their humility (eroding identity) then all the prisoners wear the same clothing with a number tag (rebuilding identity).
The prisoners are told when to eat, sleep, use the bathroom (lack of free will) that they become to that lifestyle so when they are released it is hard for them to do as they please. An example of this is with Red was allowed parole and when he was working at the grocery store, he had to ask the manager every time he had to use the bathroom (even though there was no rule set for him to do so) because he had being accustomed to asking for permission for anything.
When the prisoners are sent to the “hole” (solitude) they are not allowed to talk to anyone and are just given food during their time. When Andy was sent to the hole for one month, which later became two months he was slowing going insane (his laughter when the Warden gave him another month in the hole). Humans need relationships so when we are deprived of that it can lead to loneliness and possibly insanity if they are left alone for long enough with just their own

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