How does Harper Lee vividly capture the effects of racism and social inequality on the citizens of Maycomb county in ‘To kill a mockingbird’? In the novel, ‘To kill a mockingbird’, Harper Lee conveys the theme of racism and social inequality by setting up the story in Maycomb, a small community in Alabama, the U.S back in 1930s. Lee presents some of the social issues of 1930s such as segregation and poverty in the novel. These issues are observed and examined through the innocent eyes of a young girl, Scout, the narrator.
Pure Injustice William Goodwin once said “No man knows the value of innocence and integrity but he who has lost them.” In the novel To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Scout Finch, a young girl, lives with her brother Jem and her father Atticus, a prominent lawyer, in the town of Maycomb, Alabama during the Great Depression. Due to Atticus’ high moral standards, he feels obligated to take on a case where he defends Tom Robinson, an African American. Robinson is being wrongfully accused of raping Mayella Ewell, who is part of the most disgraced family in the town. Throughout the book, the Finch children realize the extreme prejudice and social inequality of Maycomb.
Novelist Harper Lee, in her book To Kill a Mockingbird, depicts the racism and inequalities in the town of Maycomb by having a white man, Atticus Finch, defend Tom Robinson who was black. Lee’s purpose is to show the world is unfair between races and we need to have compassion for others. She adopts a serious tone to appeal to people’s morals to do the right the thing by those seeking changes for equality. Throughout his closing argument, Atticus ensures credibility, mentioning God, and by presenting evidence that Tom Robinson is not guilty but someone in the courtroom is, to explain Mayella’s reasoning to lie.
At the end of the book, Scout and Jem realize the cruelty of the world and the effects of on different people for example, Tom Robinson and Boo Radley. In the beginning, Scout and Jem
Atticus, Boo Radley, and Mrs. Dubose are all examples of courageous characters within To Kill a Mockingbird. Scout and Jem’s father, Atticus, is just one of the wonderful examples of courageous characters within the novel. When Atticus is faced with controversy, he faces it head on and stands up for what he believes in. In the book, he is assigned to defend a black man in court who is accused of raping a white woman.
Only one year after its release, Harper Lee’s book To Kill a Mockingbird earned the glamorous Pulitzer Prize. This book contains various themes strung throughout, including the theme of social discrimination by class, often to the poor or black. One can see this subject primarily in the court case regarding the accusation of Tom Robinson, the defendant, by Mr. Ewell, the prosecutor, who respects blacks like the dirt beneath his feet. Social class also evidences itself in the contempt of people like the Cunninghams by the higher-up classes of people. High class citizens often are respectable, polite, and courteous, performing proper mannerisms and for the most part treating others well.
Restoration of Hope Imagine you were a black man living in the 20th century, and you were accused of raping a white girl. Because she is white and you are black, you are declared guilty and given the death penalty. In Harper Lee’s novel To Kill A Mockingbird, a man of color named Tom Robinson was accused of raping a white girl. Atticus, the father of the main character Scout and her brother Jem, is selected to defend Tom from the death penalty and a crime he didn’t commit.
To Kill A Mockingbird You never really understand a person until you consider things from their point of view - Until you climb into his skin and walk around in it. My topics were how is empathy demonstrated or learned by Atticus, How is Empathy demonstrated by Scout and How is empathy demonstrated or learned by Jem. How is empathy shown throughout the characters among the storyline? Atticus believes that not only black people but everyone deserves a fair go whether it's a court case or not.
The colour of his skin. The racism is prevalent in this book, and it highlights the severity of the racism in the 1930’s. This is important because it can be used in real life. Mockingbirds are all over the world, Nelson Mandela, Malala, etc. This can be used to help the real mockingbirds in the real world.
Scout, the novels main character, is a smart and inquisitive girl, she often speaks bluntly, and is shamelessly child-like and tomboy-ish. Spanning the time of about three years, the novel watched the Finch girl change and mature, making the book much like a bildungsroman. As the book progresses, Scout finds herself confused and questioning why the world is such a wicked place; her main experience being the injustice of Maycomb court’s final ruling of the Tom Robinson trial. Mr. Robinson, a chivalrous, black man, and accused of raping a young, white lady, was given a death sentence, riding only on the word of the young lady and her white, drunkard father, Bob Ewell. No clear evidence was given.
Twelve Angry Men Reginald Rose’s film, Twelve Angry Men, revolves around the decision of twelve white male jurors to confine a young Hispanic man behind a prison cell. Initially juror eight stood alone as he put forward a notion that human memory is fallible, and could not be relied on as evidence. Through the jurors, Rose captures the essence of what`s wrong with the American justice system. Rose pursues the concept of prejudice, status, racial discrimination, arrogance, justice and the need for it to be served in the justice system. During the course of the film prejudice was instrumental in acting as the defining factor to prove whether the boy was guilty or not.
In the book, To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee uses allusions to help the reader to understand the setting, and irony to show character and develop theme. Prejudice, in the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, is described as the “simple hell people give other people without even thinking”, and the novel powerfully portrays examples of racial and social prejudice. Body Paragraph #1: Harper Lee uses allusions to help the reader better understand the setting to better understand the book and it’s many themes. A part of a quote from chapter one states, “disturbance between the North and South”. This refers to the Civil War in 1861-1865, which gives the reader an estimated time period of which the book took place in, also relating to the segregation.
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).
"you never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view, until you climb in his skin and walk around in it" (Harper Lee). Harper Lee 's’ story “Too Kill a Mockingbird” is set in the 1930’s during the Great depression. Published in the 1960’s, this book won the hearts of many readers, as well as the Pulitzer prize. In her social commentary, there’s many themes that play a prodigious role in this book.
Being born in America in 1933 has shown to impact Susan Sontag, a liberal author and human rights advocate, when she stated, “I do not think white America is committed to granting equality to the American Negro... this is a passionately racist country; it will continue to be so in the foreseeable future,” on Quotestoknow.com. Susan Sontag, born in the great depression, has set the scene for To Kill A Mockingbird in an extremely powerful way. The citizens in To Kill A Mockingbird experience prejudice in many different ways. A very impactful and influential woman in this novel is an African American woman named Calpurnia.