Similarities Between Mayella Ewell And To Kill A Mockingbird

In Maycomb county, Alabama in the mid 1930’s. Tom Robinson an African American is accused of rape by Mayella Ewell, a poor white woman. Mayella Ewell is a young, poor white woman who lives with her father in what was once a Negro cabin, Mayella’s father Bob Ewell is a racist white man. Mayella has power, but very little of it. She uses race and gender to her advantage, but can not use class to her advantage because she has little money. Mayella can not use class to help her gain power because of her lack of money. She lives in an old Negro cabin behind the town garbage dump. “Its windows were merely open spaces in the walls...What passed for a fence was bits of tree-limbs, broomsticks, and tool shafts…. Enclosed by this barricade was a dirty

In the 1930’s women were not allowed to do most of the same things men were able to do. Blacks were not able to do as much as women were able to. In Maryland, 1924 a Jim Crow Law was passed saying “Any white woman who shall suffer or permit herself to be got with a child by a negro or mulatto...shall be sentenced to the penitentiary for not less than eighteen months.”. This Jim Crow Law states that if a white woman conceives a child with a black or “mixed” person, the woman shall spend eighteen months in jail. In Georgia, 1926 another Jim Crow Law was passed stating “No colored barber shall serve as a barber to white women or girls.”. This law states that any barber that is not white can not be a barber to white women or girls. “‘Except when he’s drinking?’ asked Atticus so gently that Mayella nodded.” (Lee, Chapter 18). Mayella is beaten by her father, he takes advantage of her being scared of him several times. “...What did her father do? We don’t know, but there is circumstantial evidence to indicate that Mayella Ewell was beaten savagely by someone who led almost exclusively with his left...” (Lee, Chapter 20). Bob Ewell is left handed, in the story Tom Robinson is blamed for the mark on Mayella’s face. Tom cannot use his left hand at all, so Tom is no longer blamed for the mark. Bob Ewell was a horrible person and dad. “He says you goddamn whore, I’ll kill ya.” (Lee, Chapter 19). In this chapter Tom is getting questioned by