Race, Disability and Abolition in Stephen King’s The Green Mile

This study focuses on how various audiences interpret The Green Mile, Stephen King’s narrative that deals with race, disability and the prison system. Using a mixed-methods design, we used interviews, social media posts, translated editions and sound patterns. What has emerged from the results contains clear generational differences, with older audiences frequently perceiving the tale as an emotional story of kindness and sacrifice where younger respondents linked one of the remaining and ongoing debates about racism, disability justice and prison reforms. Translation analysis revealed that frequently in the Spanish, Russian, Japanese and Uzbek versions key racial and disability markers were altered or watered down. Sound design had a strong influence on affective responses, particularly for healing scenes. Across all the data streams, three modes of reception became apparent: emotional acceptance, critical engagement and abolitionist rejection. These results show the impact of social context, translation practices and media platforms on the interpretive frameworks of viewers and the ways in which the film’s meaning is recontextualized for modern viewers.