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To kill a mockingbird critiques
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Literary criticisms of to kill a mockingbird
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In the classical 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee depicts the social and racial inequality in southern American society during the 1930’s. Residing in Maycomb County, Atticus Finch and his two children, Scout and Jem, gain appreciation for tolerance as they encounter diverse characters such as Tom Robinson and Boo Radley. Told from Scout’s perspective of their adventures, Jem and Scout explore the prejudicial flaws of their community. The portrayal of a catalyst and prophet matches the personality of Jeremy “Jem” Atticus Finch; serving as the brother and friend of his sister Scout, Jem’s once innocent and naive world view is exposed to the less savory aspects of southern culture when his father takes on a case defending an African American man accused of rape. As the dehumanizing factors of institutionalized and widespread racial discrimination and prejudice become evident, Jem learns that empathy and human understanding are crucial in realizing full human potential.
According to the United Nations Foundation, 62 million girls around the world are refused education and mentorship programs, such as Step Up helps to maintain girls in school to get them closer to achieve their dreams. The novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee focuses on the lives of Jem and Scout as Scout retales three years of her childhood in the span of 372 pages. The story is about growing up in Alabama during the 1930s after the Great Depression, where there happens to be large abundance of discrimination in the small fictional town of Maycomb County. Through the eyes of Scout, readers see how her father, Atticus, is very passionate and dedicated to his work of being an attorney and standing up to discrimination. Similarity to how Atticus advocated for
Everybody is Equal The novel To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, introduces the main characters Scout, Jem , Atticus, and Calpurnia. In the beginning, the characters wonder what has become of Boo Radley. Was he anything like what they have heard, and is he truly the monster the town thinks he is? As the story moves on they become concerned about what will happen to Tom Robinson during the trial and if he will be plead guilty or not.
“Now don’t you be so confident, Mr. Jem, I ain’t ever seen any jury decide in favor of a colored man over a white man…” (Lee 179). This quote from Reverend Sykes in To Kill a Mockingbird is a sort of summary of how and why Tom Robinson was wrongly convicted guilty. It also gives a lot of insight on race relations in this time period. Unfortunately, racism has yet to leave society.
“As Mr.Dolphus Raymond was an evil man accepted his invitation reluctantly”(pg.200) Dolphus Raymond is known for having mixed children with a black woman. This makes him appear as an outcast and a bad person which shows both discrimination and good vs evil, which is especially expressed in the trial of Tom Robinson and Mayyella Ewell. In Harper Lee's book To Kill a Mockingbird, she uses the trial to create the themes of good vs evil and discrimination. Bob Ewell shows this through what he says, what he thinks as well as the language he uses, also how a trial is set up, and what happens in the testimonies show good vs evil. It also shows discrimination by where the people have to sit, with the section specifically for black people.
Institutionalized racism gave whites the right to claim their racial superiority. In The Long Walk Home, the discourteous police officer demanded that Odessa Carter leave the whites only park, regardless of the white children that she was appointed to look after. In To Kill a Mockingbird, the all-white jury convicted Tom Robinson of raping Miss Mayella after being presented with more than enough evidence to prove Tom to be an innocent man. Spoken from Michelle Alexander, the highly accredited author of The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, “Following the Civil War, it was unclear what institutions, laws, or customs would be necessary to maintain white control now that slavery was gone. ”(Alexander, pp 26)
A Discriminated World History as we know, will forever shape the future. We can only hope that the prejudice that was present in our nation's history, will NEVER occur again. The novel To Kill A Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee, is a story about a young girl, and her journey through a world of prejudice. The setting is Maycomb Alabama, a small and quiet southern town with many types of people. Of course segregation of races were very common at the time of the this book.
In To Kill a Mockingbird there are lots of racial, gender, and religious, discrimination. Which is shown a multiple amount of times throughout the novel. To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel written by Harper Lee which takes place in Maycomb Alabama, where there is a lot of racial discrimination. But there is also some gender, and religious, discrimination.
Racial injustice was a powerful aspect that significantly impacted the Jim Crow laws in the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. For example, in To Kill a Mockingbird, the courtroom seating arrangement was divided between the blacks and the whites. The whites sat at the bottom and the blacks sat on top of the balcony. The law and jury were one-sided. The jury in the novel were all white and all male.
In the historical fiction novel, Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebie explains the importance of kinsmen. The main character, Okonkwo, has a feast to honor his kinsmen because he believes that “It is good for kinsmen to meet. Chinua reveals the importance of kinsmen by making comparisons, using repetitions and simile. Okonkwo’s uncle, Uchendu, begins to speak of the significance of having a relationship with people of their land. He explains, “An animal rubs its itching flank against a tree, a man asks his kinsman to scratch him.”
In the book I think the element of racial discrimination against blacks is controversial today. Harper Lee describes a common theme in the book, being that whites are superior to blacks no matter what. In our world today, the African American race is still held to this degree but some feel otherwise. Some people in the world feel that whites and blacks are treated equally and the issue of racism does not exist anymore; others feel it is very much alive today in our word and we are still taking steps to overcome it. I found this element of the book very insightful because it allowed me to see a different view of racism and how it could still be going on today.
In Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird, undoubtedly there is more than one type of discrimination displayed. Before we get into that, what exactly is discrimination? Well, to discriminate means to treat someone differently based on what they believe, their age, gender, who they love, even their appearance. The forms that I will be talking about are Sexism, (Prejudice actions based on gender) Racism, (Prejudice actions based on race) classism, (Prejudice actions on those of a different social class) and discrimination on those with a disability.
Discrimination by definition is “the unjust treatment of different categories of people or things especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex.” To Kill A Mockingbird is a novel written by Harper Lee set in the small southern town of Maycomb in the 1930s. The 1930s were a time of racial inequality, social unrest, and the start of the civil rights movement. It was also a time of the Great Depression which left many families poor and impoverished. The most obvious form of discrimination in the book is racism but there are several other types present in the book including discrimination based on class, gender, and other social stereotypes.
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.
Hedonism vs. authentic happiness theory of well-being Name: Ida Duvnjak Student number:201703451 Course: Track B Teacher: R. Rodogno Date: 8-11-2017 Philosophical theories of well-being can be divided in subjective and objective theories of well-being.
