6-5, 7-1, 7-2 Social Justice Spreads Reflection

 

Reflection : 

This was a tough social justice topic to cover as I had to uncover what it felt to be in a solitary confinement prisoner's shoes as I looked for data. At first, I wanted to focus on the topic as a whole but after a while, I wanted to focus on minors like myself to make the project a lot more meaningful. I found myself struggling to design. I no longer remembered the basics of design and found myself double guessing myself how to achieve the looks I was going for. This was by far the project I found interest in but did not know how to start to design or even where to base my theme from. I felt the process was messy. And putting together these spreads was confusing because I did not have text information to use as a reference to where to place my images. I did for sure like the way I improvised along the way. I liked the process of breaking it down by parts such as doing the "Data Visualization" as one part of the pages, and another being doing collages separately. The first spread I tried to introduce the topic with what exactly is prison for juveniles and what the numbers are looking like for the youth in "Restrictive Facilities", aka another way the government tries to place nicer names for cruel practices. I wanted to open it up with youth being the main focus, and then adding in real life experiences in the second spread. I took a CollegeNow class from Howard University during my Spring Term 2023 of my Junior Year. I wrote a research paper in APA format and received feedback from a Teaching Assistant from this university. I worked on the paper for about two weeks and I loved that class overall. It was important to me to understand my rights in case I am ever placed in a situation where I need to exercise my rights as an individual. The topic I chose for that research paper was Solitary Confinement and the effects. One person I focused upon is Albert Woodfox. He was this individual who was a part of the Black Panthers back in the late 1960's. He was serving a sentence for armed robbery when, in 1972, a white guard was killed. Despite a lack of evidence, Woodfox and two other men, all Black Panthers at the time, were accused of the crime and sentenced to life in solitary confinement. They became known as the “Angola 3” and maintained their innocence. Albert was placed in Louisiana State Penitentiary, it was at the time known as “America's Bloodiest Prison,” and its largest maximum security prison in the nation. He was in Solitary Confinement for 43 years and 10 months in solitary, believed to be more than any other US inmate ever. He was one of the most notable examples of Solitary Confinement and was the reason for these spreads. I thought I would share my knowledge of this individual since it's one of the few "fun facts" that I found that I will never forget about. The last spread was solely to just explain the process and what I felt it was important for people to always understand of the tragedy of the process of Solitary Confinement and how the effects are even worse than the crime made from these criminals.