To Kill A Mockingbird Feminist Analysis

Feminine Perceptions Within To Kill a Mockingbird Gloria Steinem once said, “A feminist is anyone who recognizes the equality and full humanity of women and men.” The classic historical fiction novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, contains many prevailing ideas that showcase the reoccurring theme of social faults between genders in the 1930s. A story told in the perspective of Scout Finch, sister to Jem Finch and the daughter of a widowed father, Atticus. A young boy, Dill, who moves into their small town of Maycomb, often acts out scenes from books, or goes on adventure through the neighborhood with the siblings. Scout finds herself constantly nagged by many older women figures, saying that she’s too much of a tomboy, or she needs

Yet, as the story progresses, she sees her brother in a new light. One day, Scout stumbled upon a bug in the kitchen and decided to stop and play with it for a few minutes. After playing for quite some time, she had the urge to crush it, when suddenly Jem walked in just in the nick of time to stop her. He scolded her immediately and Scout let out an exasperated sigh. She rolled over a began degrading Jem in her thoughts, saying that, “Jem was the one who was getting more like a girl every day, not I” (Lee 242). While Jem criticized Scout for not being girly enough, she turns around and does the exact same to him. It’s not long before Scout begins to nit-pick at how Jem is losing his masculinity. As the siblings grow older and apart from each other, it’s rare that they hang out. Scout notices that Jem has signed up for football, but slowly realizes the fate that he has been place with. He isn’t the typical “football” playing boy, and definitely has the looks to match, rightfully so. Scout thinks to herself while watching Jem out on the field, “He went out for football, but was too slender and too young yet to do anything but carry the team water buckets” (Lee 245). He was given this duty solely because of the fact that he did not fit the body requirements for a football player. Jem is incapable of playing due to his frame, so he is given an easy job just for the sake of giving him something to do. While he may not realize it, Jem too, has fallen victim to gender