Carli Bonnett Mrs. Lawson English 10 19 January 2023 Prejudice in Maycomb County In Maycomb county, Alabama there was a court case full of injustice and bias. Maycomb county is a fairly tight-knit community but they still have its faults. In the Book To Kill a Mockingbird, there is a lawyer Atticus finch. He represented Tom Robinson who is a colored man that was accused of raping a girl named Mayella Ewell.
We will always live with Prejudice, because we may experience it first hand or do it without realizing .In the book To Kill A Mockingbird , Harper Lee portrays many themes, but a theme that is seen throughout most of the book is prejudice. In the city of Maycomb ,many civilians are treated differently based on the color of their skin, economic status ,beliefs ,identity and much more. In To Kill A Mockingbird , Harper Lee shows that prejudice takes over the minds of civilians in Maycomb and prevent them from seeing citizens for who they truly are. This is seen through the civilians in Maycomb towards Tom Robinson, Boo Radley and Atticus Finch.
The Tom Robinson case displays the brutality of both social and racial prejudice. Despite the jurors long decision making process, they decided to vote along racial lines (which is not a surprise in Maycomb) without any regard for truth or justice. The people involved in the case are Tom Robinson, Mayella Ewell, Atticus Finch, Bob Ewell. Tom is being accused of raping Bob Ewell’s daughter, Mayella, and this allows the author, Harper Lee, to dig deeper into issues of prejudice in the city of Maycomb. To begin with, the trial gives readers an opportunity to witness Atticus at work.
There are many different types of prejudice, such as racial prejudice, prejudice against where people come from and age prejudice. People may judge another person based on their looks, the way they dress or the way they talk. Prejudice is based on ignorance. This is shown in the novel To Kill A Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee when the following characters are judged: Tom Robinson, Atticus Finch, and Boo Radley.
In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, prejudice is portrayed in many ways. Three characters that experience prejudice is Boo Radley, Atticus Finch, and Tom Robinson. Boo Radley is not treated like he fits into the town, Atticus Finch is being judged because he is presenting a black person in court, and Tom Robinson experiences prejudice because he is black. The people in Maycomb think Boo Radley is different, so they treat him like he does not belong in the town. The citizens in Maycomb think that Boo’s actions are not normal.
The Presence of Prejudice In Harper Lee’s great depression era novel To Kill a Mockingbird, she fuels a raving battle against prejudice in a steadfastly racist society. The protagonist, Jean-Louise “Scout” Finch, looks on as the fires of prejudice rage all around her beginning “the summer Dill came”(3), and ending when “Bob Ewell fell on his knife”(314) several years later. During the period between these events, Lee kindles situations that, “ain’t right”(242), like the diffident treatment one lawyer gives when cross-examining Tom Robinson, a black man wrongly tried and convicted of rape, and later on where Tom’s defendant must remind the jury that not “all Negroes lie, that [not] all Negroes are basically immoral beings,” (232) and even a
In Harper Lee's, To Kill A Mockingbird, is the story of a small southern town in Alabama during the Great Depression. Harper Lee expresses her disapproval of the mistreatment of human beings and her philosophy through the eyes of the main character Scout. Over the course of several summers she, along with her brother Jem and playmate Dill, are introduced to a world of hatred and unfairness through the injustice of the Tom Robinson trial. Lee shows the unfair trial of an innocent man to demonstrate the prejudiced ways of Maycomb, Alabama during this time, highlighting the racism and violent treatment towards black people all around. Prejudice, described as the “simple hell people give other people without even thinking”(170).
A Fading Preconception Throughout To Kill a Mockingbird, the town of Maycomb prejudices Tom Robinson for his skin tone and previous experiences with negro men and women. To Kill a Mockingbird took place during The Great Depression. People were losing their jobs and beloved families. Tom Robinson, a negro man in To Kill a Mockingbird, had to deal with the entire town of Maycomb against him during the Great Depression. In Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, Lee shows how the town of Maycomb goes against a black man in the south during times of prejudice and racism.
“There is no greater disability in society, than the inability to see a person as more”-Robert M Hensel. The book To Kill a Mockingbird, explores the powers and prejudice of racism in the 1930s. During the Great Depression, a young girl named Scout, starts to notice more injustice within her town. Through her eyes, we witness the pervasive racism that exists in her community. Harper Lee’s
The Penalties Of Prejudice ― Michael Crichton, said ““Do you know what we call opinion in the absence of evidence? We call it prejudice.” This quote is a very good baseline for a lot of the events that occur in Harper Lees ``To Kill A Mockingbird”. It states how by allowing these acts of injustice to occur you are making a choice to side with oppression.
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee tells a story of racial prejudice during the Depression and how it is combated. The main development in the novel is that a Atticus, the father of Scout and Jem, has been appointed to defend Tom Robinson, a black man accused of raping a young white woman named Mayella. Many people in the town of Maycomb, particularly people involved with the case of Tom, have a negative attitude towards African Americans. Prejudice was a terrible issue in the South during the Depression, but Atticus Finch shows that racial injustice can be combated in two main ways, each having different levels of effectiveness.
A white man's word against a black man's word, a white man's word will always win—the unfortunate reality of black people in the 1930s. The novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee is an ideal example that demonstrates and illustrates the racism and prejudice of black people back then. The book consists of a white girl named Scout Finch who grows up in Maycomb a place where racism is normalized and taught throughout generations. We see how the black community is treated unequally and where the recurring theme of white privilege comes up one being when the case of Tom Robinson comes to light. We see a black man with no rights, no voice, and no hope being persecuted by an all-white jury.
In the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee illustrates a story surrounding the prejudice of the time and its impact on the innocence of the children in the town. The narrative takes place in the small town of Maycomb, Alabama. An old, suffocating town, home to aimlessly fueled hatred and bias. “Maycombs Disease” describes the behaviors portrayed by the residents, which embrace the racist and classist behaviors of the time. 1930, a period of depression, was infested with discrimination among many minorities.
To Kill a Mockingbird is an iconic and award winning novel written by Harper Lee (1960), which showcases the racial discrimination, and inequalities within society. Set during the Great Depression, a prime era of racism, the fictional Alabaman community; Maycomb explores the effects of stereotyping and prejudice to raise awareness of racial inequalities and its damaging consequences. This inspires eradication of discriminatory inequalities within society, through the novel’s powerful themes of innocence loss, prejudice, and empathy. Lee drew inspiration from the Scottsboro Boys, who suffered the false accusations of gang rape by two young girls, which prominently showcased the racial injustices and biasness as they were sentenced to death.
One of the main themes of the novel is Racism. During the time of depression, racism and poverty were a common issue. People with a dark skin tone, i.e the African- Americans were seen as derogatory and treated like dirt. Harper Lee depicts it in a very realistic way.
