Examples Of Racism In To Kill A Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, was published in 1960. This novel is a realistic fiction book about a family who lives in Alabama during the Great Depression. This book has a real life plot centered around prejudice ideas that are very relatable to people who lived during the Great Depression era. Prejudice causes many social injustice issues in the novel. Many of them are based on the segregation of whites and blacks in the south during the Great Depression era.

How Society Affected Harper Lee In the book “To Kill a Mockingbird”, Harper Lee opened our eyes to how unfairly African Americans were treated in the 1930’s. The society Lee grew up in had a lot of racism and segregation. This society affected her in many ways that we can see throughout her book. First of all, racism was one of the things that affected Harper Lee. Many people in the South believed that African Americans were not as good as white people.

Race used to affect every aspect of life, especially for people of color, from the way you talked to where you were able to sit. The novel, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee has many examples of this. It takes place in a fictional part of Alabama called Maycomb County, during the Great depression. The main character and narrator is a girl named Jean Louise Finch, but most people call her Scout. She has an older brother named Jem and a father named Atticus.

Racism is a theme that has run through the world during all of history. In “To Kill A Mockingbird”, by Harper Lee, the main character is a girl named Scout, growing up with her brother, Jem, and her father, Atticus, in a racist town in Alabama called Maycomb during the Great Depression and the early 1930s. Atticus is a lawyer and he has to defend a black man named Tom Robinson against the claim he raped Mayella Ewell. The Ewell family has no money or education. He loses the case because of racial prejudices, but he hurts the pride of the Ewell family.

Atticus then tells Jem that if the jury was made up of him and eleven other boys, like Jem, then Tom Robinson would be a free man today. He then says,"There 's something in our world that makes men lose their heads --they couldn 't be fair if they tried. In our courts, when it 's a white man 's word against a black man 's, the white man always wins. They 're ugly, but those are the facts of life" (295). This is implying the prejudicial ways of Maycomb and how their views on the different races.

The Search For Justice In society, people are constantly trying to find justice throughout their lives. In To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Atticus Finch is searching for justice throughout the novel. Atticus has to defend Tom Robinson, an African American man who is falsely being accused of assaulting a white woman. In Atticus’s unsuccessful attempt to find justice, he uses his morals and values, which helps his understanding of what justice is. Atticus believes in fairness and integrity, which makes him understand what justice truly is.

Samuel Leibowitz was appointed to defend the Scottsboro boys and Atticus was appointed to defend Tom Robinson. Although they were both appointed to defend the accused they believed in the innocence of their clients and worked to bring them the justice. Samuel Leibowitz, however, took the case against his wife and friends wishes who told him he would not win due to the defendants’ skin color but he was determined to win (Linder, Samuel Leibowitz). Atticus Finch was also a man of justice. He stated that “simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win” (Lee 101).

Atticus displays courage when taking on a case he knows he cannot win, even though the majority of Maycomb County disagrees with his decision, he proceeds knowing that it is the right thing to do. Lee depicts Atticus as being courageous by showing that he does not mind others opinions on his case . After being confronted by her classmates about her father defending an african-american man, Scout asks Atticus why people are against him, in response he states that, “I’m simply defending a negro...there’s been some high talk around town to the effect that I shouldn’t do much about defending this man. It’s a peculiar

Racial Injustices Racism in the 1930’s served as an injustice to blacks that were convicted of crimes. In the time periods of the book To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, and The Scottsboro Boys trial, discrimination in Alabama was atrocious, and racial injustice was seen throughout this time period. The Scottsboro trial shows how discrimination played a large role in Alabama during the 1930’s. This influenced Harper Lee’s to write about the Tom Robinson case. In many ways, the Scottsboro trials were more similar to the Tom Robinson case, but at some points had differences.

Just one year after To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee was published, it was awarded the illustrious Pulitzer Prize as well as several other literary awards. This novel displays the prejudice and discrimination against African American people that was present in the south during the 1930s, which was during the Great Depression. Prejudice is an unfavorable opinion that is formed before actual knowledge or experience, and discrimination is the unfair treatment of others. Discrimination includes but is not limited gender, race, and social status. Some examples of prejudice and discrimination shown in To Kill A Mockingbird are Aunt Alexandra pushing Jean Louise (Scout) to behave “like a lady” would, Boo Radley being prejudged for staying inside

Set in the Deep South, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird peruses themes of racism and the overall social inequality of blacks and whites. The narrator, Jean Louise “Scout” Finch, being only a child, conveys to the reader her scrutiny of the social statuses of inhabitants of Maycomb, Alabama. In essence, this timeless novel by Harper Lee depicts ideas of good vs. evil, and also nature vs. nurture. It is apparent that the good (The Finches) and the evil (The Ewells) have two completely irreconcilable views on where African Americans should be positioned on the theoretical social ladder. The hate the Ewells, otherwise known as the most poverty-stricken of the small town, had for blacks can be described as an absurd and in every way senseless judgment.

OUTLINE Thesis: The repercussions of institutionalized prejudice are far too great for any group to overcome. Jim Crow laws repressed many black americans in the 1850s and the repercussions of that are still affecting black society today. Similarly in the 1800s woman were legally restricted from many of the things men were and still are still unfairly treated to in society today. Main Idea: Jim Crow laws repressed many black americans in the 1850s. Use JIM CROW LAWS to talk about the hardships .

Tom Robinson is in court because he is accused of raping Bob Ewell 's daughter. Tom is a black man and during that time they were still being discriminated and being treated unfairly. Bob is a white man and when a white man accuses a black man of anything the white man is the outcome is usually in the white man 's favor. In the courthouse Atticus was trying to defend Tom Robinson, he uses an allusion and says, "But there is one way in this country in which all men are created equal--there is one human institution that makes a pauper the equal of a Rockefeller, the stupid man the equal of an Einstein..." (210). Atticus alludes the jury to two of the most famous men in the era.

(17) Following this statement, Bob Ewell indicates racism throughout the trial. Although the evidence placed in the trial proves Tom Robinson is not quality, a white man’s word is taken over a black man’s word. The jury creates a life changing verdict. Not only Tom Robinson but also his wife, Helen, has to face prejudice when the trials verdict is declared. Bob Ewell accuses Tom Robinson of raping Mayella although Bob’s daughter “tempted a nigger.” () Tom Robinson is later faced with a dangerous situation.

Many people today do not like to admit the bias that underlies their reasoning. Many of these people fear Islamic Fundamentalists; however, most attacks on the United States were the effect of Political Extremists, Nationalists, and even Racial/Religious Supremacists. In Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, many of the characters in the town of “Maycomb” show the extremity of how biased they are towards white people. Throughout the novel, the reader catches a glimpse of many different types of discrimination including; racial, social status, age, gender etc.. Taking place in Alabama during the Depression, the reader observes as the young protagonists transition from innocence to maturity.