In the novel, “To Kill A Mockingbird”, Harper Lee categorizes power using class, race and gender. Mayella Ewell, living in Maycomb, Alabama, starts allegations that Tom, a poor-Negro man of rape. Living in the South during the 1930s could have been difficult but Mayella, a white women can make it. (“DBQ is Mayella Ewell powerful?” 19) states “-that all Negroes lie, that all Negroes are basically immoral beings, that all Negro men are not to be trusted around are women….”, meaning she will most likely win the trial because of her race.
Gender to Ms.Ewell is a powerful topic. Being a female and white are the perfect combinations at the time. But, though she is a lady she does not know how to be treated like one. In (“DBQ is Mayella Ewell powerful?”
One day in Maycomb, Alabama during the great depression a young girl named Mayella Ewell was raped. This shows Mayella is one powerful young girl in the story To Kill A Mockingbird. It will show how she is power through class, race, and gender. First Mayella is powerful through her class ranking. In the story it said that the “Maycomb’s Ewells lived behind the town garbage dump in what was once a Negro cabin…”.
In the novel To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, the story is set in the 1900’s, Maycomb, Alabama. During this time there was racism in the south and segregation which separated the whites and blacks from everything. There was also the Great Depression, the whole country was poor and people living in the country had to trade and do other jobs for people to either pay them off or to buy something from them. The trial in this book is about Mayella and Bob Ewell, two white people, claiming and arguing that Tom Robinson, a black person, raped Mayella Ewell. This trial is really important because at that time in the south, white people took advantage of black people and their kindness and thought they would take that or shut up just because they were black.
Rajan Dosanjh Mrs. Haber ENG 1D0A January 18, 2017 To Kill A Mockingbird Theme Essay Discrimination is a societal issue which has been prevalent for a long time and still brings people down in today’s society. Discrimination can be defined by the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex (www.dictionary.com) Lee’s book To Kill a Mockingbird is based in a small town in Alabama called Maycomb where a man named Atticus Finch is appointed to defend a man named Tom Robinson who was accused of raping a teenage girl.
During the Great Depression, most African-Americans didn’t have a voice when it came to many things. This is exactly the case with Mayella Ewell vs Tom Robinson in To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. In a small town of Alabama, there was a trial, for a colored man who allegedly raped a 19-year-old girl named Mayella Ewell. Tom Robinson was appointed an attorney named Atticus Finch, who despite having not really met the man believed in Tom’s innocence and is determined to figure out a way to prove it. Even though there was strong evidence to prove that he was innocent the jury still believed he was guilty.
Her gender further makes her powerless when Tom was explaining that Mr. Ewell said, “He says you goddamn whore, I’ll kill ya.” (Document B). Mr. Ewell would only refer to a woman like that because the word is mainly used against women. Mayella’s gender negatively impacts her power by causing her to be more vulnerable and regarded
They say everyone has a voice and should be heard but when an innocent African-American male is up against a young American female nobody listens to him anymore. In the novel To Kill A Mocking by Harper Lee, an African-American male is called to court for assaulting a young white woman, Mayella Ewell. Atticus Finch is his lawyer and will need to do what he can for Tom as this case will not settle well with the Town of Maycomb. Mayella Ewell did not grow up rich as she was in a lower class than others. She has 7 siblings and a father who drinks all the time.
Power, isn’t it something we all want? This court case, we set in a rape crime that has supposedly been committed by a young black fellow named Tom Robinson. The victim of this crime is Mayella Ewell and she’s white and a young girl. In the 1930s racism was a big factor in this case. Now does Mayella have more power because of race?
First, she had to make up a story about Tom Robinson because she had kissed a black man, which was frowned upon for a white woman to do. “She was white and she tempted a Negro. She did something that in our society in unspeakable: she kissed a black man”(272). Mayella is also used as an example when she convinces the jury to convict an innocent black man because of Southern Womanhood. “That n***** took advantage of me, an’ if you fine fancy gentlemen don’t wanna do nothin’ about it then you’re all yellow stinkin’ cowards, stinkin’ cowards, the lot of you”(251).
Is Mayella Ewell powerful or not? Mayella Ewell, the poorest girl in the town of Maycomb, Alabama, living on a pig farm with her abusive father and in an abandoned Negro shack. The Ewell’s are the lowest of the low in the town of Maycomb, in rank wise and are not respected too much either. Bob Ewell, father of Mayella Ewell is an abusive man, sexually and physically and has an alcoholic problem. Mayella is usually beaten and sexually assaulted by him, especially when he is drinking, but Mayella has a plan that will let her be free from Bob.
To put it differently, Mayella Ewells had power but, she had power in many differents ways. Her most powerful was her race. Her race had helped her out a lot due to Tom being African American. But for gender Mayella has power but no power. Mayella Ewell's weakest part about her is her class.
But she said he took advantage of her, and when she stood up she looked at him as if he were dirt beneath her feet.” Mayella’s loneliness and powerlessness drove her to have an affair with a black man, breaking a societal code. She is a victim of poverty because of the hatred and discrimination occurring in Maycomb. Although some might view Mayella Ewell as a victim, others might view her as a villain because she broke a societal code by attempting to have an affair with a Negro.
Tom Robinson is a young African-American who's been accused of raping and abusing Mayella Ewell, a young and closeted white woman. Racial discrimination is hinted throughout Tom’s trial as Atticus Finch explains to Jem that a white man’s word will always win over that of a black man’s - "... 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" (220). Atticus explains to Jem that in the courts of Maycomb, a black man’s state of innocence or guilt is truly determined by a white man’s testimony.
Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, is set in the 1960’s, a time when men and women had specific and restrictive roles in society. Men were the ones to work and earn money for their families and women were expected to a caring and obedient homemakers. In many ways, those gender stereotypes are still very present today. The contrasting opinions of Atticus Finch and Aunt Alexandra provide the reader with the different views on how men and women should be raised, which in turn, affects the readers thoughts and opinions on the gender expectations and roles that are present in today’s society.
In a trial the closing argument is the most critical addresses made in court. Generally an emotional plea, this closing argument can be the deciding factor to a court case. To Kill a Mockingbird is a 1962 film based on the award-winning novel written by Harper Lee. During an era of racial inequality, lawyer, Atticus Finch, contravenes the unwritten social code to defend a black man against an underserved rape charge. In a racially charged atmosphere, “white trash” Mayella Ewell ignores the morality and conventions of the community, and makes a sexual advance on Tom Robinson.
This behaviour is deemed as natural, and few people question the roles put in place, this is truly terrifying so we are lead to wonder if what we accept as normal is perhaps corrupt instead. Race is the dominant cause of inequality in To Kill A Mockingbird, thus Maycomb’s views on race heavily influence every aspect of life. Although racial inequality is clearly illustrated in the in the injustice, prejudice, discrimination and antagonism surrounding the Tom Robinson trial, it is also shown more subtly throughout the novel. In Chapter 25 Atticus Finch is quoted disclosing that the corrupt justice system is a direct cause of a racist society. “In our courts, when it 's a white man’s word against a black man’s, the white man always wins” (Lee, 295).