In the modern day it’s hard to believe there’s even still ‘’witch hunts’’ as you can say where a group of people are stereotyped as something without them doing the actual stereotypical thing. We live in a world where blacks are getting shot for no reason when they were just walking down the street unarmed and not harming anyone. Blacks and Latinos are always looked down upon in any shape or form. They could be driving a nice car they get pulled over for suspicion of a stolen car, they can get pulled over in an old broken car and they will get pulled over for suspicion of ‘’criminal activity’’. But if it’s a white person the cops will NOT bat a single eye at them despite being in the same situations as the black. And you know what the problem …show more content…
This trial was held in Salem but people all around Salem who were accused of witchcraft were bought to Salem for trial. The Salem Witch Trial was a trial for people being accused of associating with witch craft. Over 100 men and women majority of them being women were in this trial. The trial had a 3 step process first was a confession then a testimony of two eyewitnesses to the act of witchcraft and a rare ‘’spectral evidence’’ where most of these witches didn’t make it too. A spectral evidence is when the accused person’s spirit or spectral appeared in a testimony dream when the accused witch was at another location. During a trial if you could recite the ‘’Lord’s prayer’’ you were not a witch and you could indeed be let go during trial just for reciting the prayer (Louis-Jacques, Lyonette. "Http://news.lib.uchicago.edu/blog/2012/10/29/the-salem-witch-trials-a-legal-bibliography-for-halloween/." The University of Chicago Library News. 29 Oct. 2012). The trial was during the Puritan times so people believe during trial, these witches could harm anyone in the court houses (Purdy, Sean. ‘’Conjuring History: The many interpretations of The Salem Witch Trials.’’ Reviver Academic Journal, vol. 3, no. 1, 2007, pp. 2.). At the end of the trial 19 men and women were hanged at Gallows …show more content…
While Author Miller’s play wasn’t focused directly on why communism was right or wrong he used another event which was the Salem Witch Trials. Arthur Miller’s play also involved in an unfair trial which accused many of things people weren’t just like the Salem Witch Trials and the Red Scare. The Salem Witch Trials accused many people of being witches and did not give any of them a fair trial so basically an automatic ‘’guilty’’ and The Red Scare, Joseph McCarthy thought there was soviet spies in the United States and was paranoid just like everyone during the Salem Witch Trials when there was nothing to be scared of. So the Lesson to be learned in the two events and the story is that, history repeats itself it may be not exactly the same but it will be in the same
At that time in American history, paranoia spread around the concept of communism and its potential threats. People began to wrongfully accuse others of being communist or supporting communism, similar to how the characters in the play wrongfully accused people of being witches. Just as those accused of being witches were asked to name whom else they knew of to be witches, those accused of communism were asked to do the same. With this system came the spread of uneasiness throughout the country of America and the town of Salem. Miller wished to showcase the crazy nature of McCarthyism in a way that people would be able to comprehend. The hysteria in both cases was caused simply by fear and not by actual
Accusations of witchcraft ran rampant in the 17th century colonial settlements in the United States. The individuals accused, mostly women, were put on trial and punished, if found guilty. The most well-known of such cases on public record are the Salem Witch Trials. Between February, 1692 and May, 1693, hearings and prosecutions were set up to deal with those accused of dabbling in the dark arts in the cities of Andover, Salem, and Ipswich, all in Massachusetts Bay. These trials came to commonly be referred to as the Salem Witch Trials because some of the most notorious cases were heard in the Oyer and Terminer courts in Salem. At the time, practicing witchcraft was considered a serious crime, and was often punished with serious consequences.
Arthur Miller intended to break the fear of the cold war and respond to Senator McCarthy and Communism. The play was a metaphor for the red scare. The red scare was during 1947-1956 and is also called McCarthyism.
The Salem Witch trials were when hundreds of citizens of Salem, Massachusetts were put on trial for devil-worship or witchcraft and more than 20 were executed in 1692. This is an example of mass religion paranoia. The whole ordeal began in the home of Reverend Samuel Parris. People soon began to notice strange behavior from Parris’s slave, Tituba, and his daughters. Many claimed to have seen Parris’s daughters doing back magic dances in the woods, and fall to the floor screaming hysterically. Not so long after, this strange behavior began to spread across Salem.
...in their family to become sick and possibly die. Many people were accused of witchcraft. More than twenty people died all together. One person was flattened to death because he was accused of witchcraft. When people were accused they had to go to jail, which the conditions were terrible. Then, they had to get a trial from the Court of Oyer and Terminer. After an accused witch had their trial, and went to jail, they would be carted off to Gallows Hill. This was the hill where all the witches were hanged. After a witch was hanged, later that night, their family would usually take the body down and give it a proper burial. The Salem Witchcraft Trials were one of the most terrible times in the history of America. As you can see the chaotic Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692 were caused by superstition, the strict puritan lifestyle, religious beliefs, and hysteria.
The Salem Witch Trials took place in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692. At this time there appeared to be an outbreak of witches. This started when the children of the Goodwin family begin having mysterious fits. The doctors, not knowing what had happened to the children, blamed it on witchcraft. From that point on many people were accused of being a witch and were killed. This occurred for many different reasons; either they were hanged for their crimes, crushed by stones for refusing to stand trial on their cases, or from waiting in the jail for so long before their case came up. As people began to investigate the Salem Witch Trials further they came up with two explanations; either the people of Salem were begin acted through by the devil or
The Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692 were the largest outbreak of witch hunting in colonial New England up to that time. Although it was the largest outbreak, it was not something that was new. Witch-hunting had been a part of colonial New England since the formation of the colonies. Between the years 1648 to 1663, approximately 15 witches were executed. During the winter of 1692 to February of 1693, approximately 150 citizens were accused of being witches and about 25 of those died, either by hanging or while in custody. There is no one clear-cut answer to explain why this plague of accusations happened but rather several that must be examined and tied together. First, at the same time the trials took place, King William's War was raging in present day Maine between the colonists and the Wabanaki Indians with the help of the French. Within this war, many brutal massacres took place on both sides, leaving orphaned children due to the war that had endured very traumatic experiences. Second, many of the witch accusations were based on spectral evidence, most of which were encounters of the accused appearing before the victim and "hurting" them. There were rampant "visions" among the colonies' citizens, which can only be explained as hallucinations due to psychological or medical conditions by virtue of disease, or poisoning.
Trials regarding the witchcraft began at the dawn of 1692, after a group of young girls in Salem Village, Massachusetts, were said to be bewitched. Salem, a village that homes nearly 2,000 people, was surrounded by paranoia. Inhabitants were confined to their home during the winter
Just as it was a sin drift on to the side of the devil in the time of the crucible, it was the same to drift on to the side of communism in the 1950's, when Arthur Miller wrote this play. In the 1950's Senator Joe Macarthy set up a campaign to rid the United States of all communist supporters. These communist trials would be broadcast on national television. It would involve the accused to admit their guilt even though they were completely innocent, and give the names of 10 other would-be communists or face exile, torture, invasion of family privacy etc. Arthur Miller uses the events of the Salem witch-hunts to represent and show what the communist trials of the 1950's were. They were both based on false premises and paranoia, and as more people got involved, more people suffered, this can be summarised by calling it the 'Snowball effect.
The Salem Witch Trials took place in the summer and into the fall of the year 1692, and during this dark time of American history, over 200 people had been accused of witchcraft and put in jail. Twenty of these accused were executed; nineteen of them were found guilty and were put to death by hanging. One refused to plead guilty, so the villagers tortured him by pressing him with large stones until he died. The Salem Witch Trials was an infamous, scary time period in American history that exhibited the amount of fear people had of the devil and the supernatural; the people of this time period accused, arrested, and executed many innocent people because of this fear, and there are several theories as to why the trials happened (Brooks).
During the early winter of 1692 two young girls became inexplicably ill and started having fits of convulsion, screaming, and hallucinations. Unable to find any medical reason for their condition the village doctor declared that there must be supernatural forces of witchcraft at work. This began an outbreak of hysteria that would result in the arrest of over one hundred-fifty people and execution of twenty women and men. The madness continued for over four months.
There are some events in history that put the human race to shame; however, these occasions can change our future forever. Society cannot deny that social injustices occur almost every day, maybe even more than once. One large blemish in our history, the Salem Witch Trials, alienated a certain group in our society. These trials were an unfortunate combination of economic conditions, a flock’s strife, teenage boredom, and personal jealousies.
Nineteen men and women hanged and one pressed to death on account of heresy. These were the results of the ever-famous Salem Witch Trials. These staggering facts were found on November twenty first 2013 from the website http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projectts/ftrials/
You see, there's this group of gals in Salem, Massachusetts who are getting pretty famous back in 1692. And they aren't celebrated for their super cool new bonnets or their fancy shamncy petticoats—nope, they're famous because they're pretending to be possessed by witches. Oh yes, you read that right: these mean girls are about to spark the Salem Witch Trials.
In Salem, a small village in Massachusetts, the atrocious events that came to be known as the Salem Witch Trials lasted from February of 1962 until May the following year. This series of trials resulted with 200 people accused, with 24 dead. 19 were executed and hung. Of the 19, 6 were male and the remaining 14 were women. Giles Corey died after three days of torture for refusing to plead guilty. The last 4 died whilst in prison. (Brooks, historyofmassachusetts.org)