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Symbolism to kill a mockingbird
Symbolism to kill a mockingbird
The use of symbolism to kill a mockingbird
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The book To Kill a Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee, communicates many different themes in this piece of Southern Gothic literature. The two main characters, Scout and Jem, learn lessons that cannot be taught anywhere else. They notice that some characters are more visible than others. These characters have the ability to be seen and heard, while others are not payed any attention. The forces in this book that make people become invisible are society, differences from those around them, and actions from other characters. The first physical factor that causes invisibility is people’s differences from those around them. To Kill a Mockingbird continually mentions how being Black makes them different from the white people in the neighborhood, …show more content…
First, the location of the novel, the South, changes how they interact with each other. Racism is very evident throughout the whole book, but is most visible during the trial and with older characters. Ms. Dubose, for example, says “Not only Finch waiting on tables but one in the courthouse lawing for a nigger!” Jem stiffened. Mrs. Dubose’s shot had gone and she knew it: “Yes indeed, what has the world come to when a Finch goes against his raisings? I’ll tell you!” She put her hand to her mouth. When she drew it away, it trailed a long silver thread of saliva. “Your father’s no better than the nigger and trash he works for!” (Lee 117) Most of the town dislikes the Finches because Atticus is white and he is defending a Black man. Jem and Scout are learning that it is caused by racism, because they live in Alabama, part of the South. The time period that this story is set in also affects invisibility and how the characters react. To Kill a Mockingbird is in the early 1930s, when the Great Depression was widespread. Atticus says "There is a tendency in this year of our grace, 1935..." (Lee 208). This sets the date exactly; since school is out, so the trial takes place in Summer 1935. The Civil Rights movement also had not happened yet, so there was still a lot of segregation in Maycomb County. Up until the 1960s there were several ‘Jim Crow’ laws to enforce separate facilities for Blacks
Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird is based during the era of racism and prejudice. This era is commonly referred to as The Great Depression and is during the mid-late 30’s. The novel is set in a small town and county called Maycomb, Alabama. The novel follows the story of the Finch’s and their struggle before, during, and after a rape trial that is set against an African American by a white woman and her father.
To Kill a Mockingbird takes place in a rural southern town in the 1930s, when racism was commonly accepted. Blacks were
To Kill A Mockingbird took place in the 1930’s, a time that was enormously charged with racial tension. One example of this is the existence of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK). Even though the KKK was in a time of decline in the 1930’s, it had been very prominent in the 1920’s and had still not completely died out. The KKK had rallies and marches. They even marched in Washington D.C. several times. They burned crosses on the lawns of any white person who would show favor towards blacks in an effort to scare them away from helping black folks. The KKK was an extremely violent group. “While African-Americans still bore the brunt of much Klan violence, Jews and Catholics topped the enemy’s list, followed by immigrants and those who transgressed Klan’s vision of morality” (“History”). The KKK showed their violence in several ways. Lynchings occurred very frequently as did raids of people’s homes.
To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel about all different kinds of stereotypes. It takes place during the 30’s in the depression. It uses a young girl’s perspective to show how these stereotypes were so abundant, and how terrible they were. The novel has many themes about racism and sexism, which the author portrays in creative ways. I believe that To Kill a Mockingbird is very much still relevant today.
The book, To Kill a Mockingbird takes place in the Early 1930’s. The 1930’s was a decade of racism,pain and struggle. However, this decade soon became the new beginning. To escape the horrendous reality of being unemployed and unable to provide for their families, many turned to entertainment to escape the hardships and realities that they were going through. Many families went to church regularly to ask for forgiveness and to hope that things would change for the better. Many churches seen about a 5 percent increase in the amount of members attending church when the Great Depression had started. Also, the 1930s was a time where there was a lot of tension between the races. Discrimination against blacks was not yet illegal, and therefore
The racism shown throughout the book, and taking the Jim Crow laws into consideration, teaches the reader about how racism can affect people, and how Scout learned that it was wrong. The Jim Crow laws enforce the fact that segregation and racism is right, and that is how things should be. But, some of the characters in To Kill a Mockingbird go against racism and segregation, teaching the readers a lesson that everyone should be treated fairly, no matter their race. Atticus, Jem and Scout are three of the greatest examples of going against racism, and the Jim Crow laws. To Kill a Mockingbird allows people to get an idea of both sides of segregation and racism, and the Finch family set off an example that should be followed in the way black people should be
A small city nestled in the state of Alabama, Maycomb has got its faults, just like any other place in the world, but one of its main faults or (pg.88) “Maycomb's usual disease,” as Atticus calls it in the book is prejudice. Jem and Scout learn a lot about prejudice when a black man named Tom Robinson is accused of raping a white woman named Mayella Ewell and their father, Atticus, is called on to be his lawyer. They realize the hate that people have buried deep within their heart when they see a black man accused of doing something only because of his color. On pg.241, Scout starts understanding this and thinks, “Atticus had used every tool available to free men to save Tom Robinson, but in the secret courts of men's hearts Atticus had no case. Tom was a dead man the minute Mayella Ewell opened her mouth and screamed.” As the case continues, up until the death of Tom Robinson, Jem and Scout learn more and more about prejudice and how the hate that people have towards others causes them to take wrong actions. They also see how unfair it is that a white man can get treated better and think of himself better than a black man only because he was born white. This prejudice and the trial cause Jem and Scout to get in argum...
Even though extraordinary changes have been made in the past to achieve racial equality, America is still racist, especially in schools. In the novel, “To Kill a Mockingbird,” written by Harper Lee, Atticus Finch is criticized for defending a black man accused of raping a white woman. During the 1930s, the time this novel took place, America was a very segregated country. At the time when Harper Lee wrote "To Kill a Mockingbird," America was fighting a civil rights movement. The events of racism in “To Kill a Mockingbird” reflect the time period.
The novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee is a simplistic view of life in the Deep South of America in the 1930s. An innocent but humorous stance in the story is through the eyes of Scout and Jem Finch. Scout is a young adolescent who is growing up with the controversy that surrounds her fathers lawsuit. Her father, Atticus Finch is a lawyer who is defending a black man, Tom Robinson, with the charge of raping a white girl. The lives of the characters are changed by racism and this is the force that develops during the course of the narrative.
To Kill a Mockingbird takes place in Maycomb, Alabama when segregation was popular in the southern states. This is a time period where women were supposed to be proper and the men were supposed to be complete gentlemen; while the black folk were supposed to stay separated from the rest of society. When the Blacks were accused of anything by Whites they would immediately would be pressed with charges. With To Kill a Mockingbird, the theme of the importance of moral education, the motif of small town life (everybody knowing each others business), and how a different time period or geographical location would affect the events within the novel; these few things have an important significance throughout Harper Lee's book.
Many students believe that Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird displays social issues in early America. In this time standing against common customs was unacceptable, a violation of society. People believe that today courage has overcome adversity that was displayed in early America. Courage is the common subject of To Kill a Mockingbird, which allows Lee’s novel to defy the changing times of humanity. These morals are bound to the “impartiality” and “fairness” taught to people as children, but become unavoidably invisible though selfish actions. The characters in To Kill a Mockingbird express audacity along with resilience in the face of cowardice.
The first historical influence in Harper Lee’s, To Kill a Mockingbird is the era of the Jim Crow laws. Jim Crow was a series of laws that segregated Blacks from Whites (Pilgrim). Jim Crow was an anti-Black, racist “way of life” in the south between 1877 and the “mid-1960s” (Pilgrim). An example of a law is that Blacks had to at all times use courtesy titles for Whites, such as Mrs., Sir, Miss, Mr., or Ma’am, but Whites never had to use those titles for Blacks (Pilgrim). There are a couple of reasons leading to as why these laws would happen. For example, many religious leaders, such as Christian ministers told people that Whites were the “Chosen people”, that Blacks were meant to be servants, and that “God supported racial segregation” (Pilgrim).
The Influence of Society in Classic Literature Throughout the course of history, there have been countless examples of the impact of both society and the times on authors and the literature they are able to craft. One of the most notable of these examples is the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. The overall reach of society’s impact is tremendous. Lee herself was heavily influenced by the circumstances she encountered as a young woman, which in turn allowed for her to create such a true classic. From this Lee was able to replicate her experiences with society in the characters Scout, Jem, and Boo.
The idea that your daily routine inside your society is normal, and that any other form of living would be somehow wrong; this ethnocentric view is not that uncommon. US American literature, as well as different media forms depict such cultural norms. In the movie adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird, young tomboy Scout slowly enters adolescents and begins to see the social dynamics that are prevalent inside her small community. The small towns social hierarchy allows for prejudicial acts, which are seen as norms; as well as acts of ethnic discrimination against the lower class black community. Although for the film’s set time these racial interactions are seen as normal events, as a current US American, these relationships are predominantly
The culture of discrimination in these parts of America was cruel to those in the coloured community. The time in which these texts were set differ as there is an approximate 50 year gap between periods, but unfortunately racial intolerance didn’t abate, it grew stronger. In ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ Scout shows how the community had a huge influence on her own racial intolerance in chapter 20 where she states “I had a feeling that I shouldn’t be listening to this sinful man who had mixed children and didn’t care who knew it… (Lee, 2004)’. The man explains to Scout that the contempt the community has towards his marriage to a black woman drive him to pretend to be an alcoholic to excuse him of his actions. This is an example of the undertone of racism in ‘To kill a Mockingbird’, which can be compared to ‘A Time to Kill’ where the displays of racism were on a grander, more vicious scale.