To Kill A Mockingbird Rhetorical Analysis

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Has one ever wondered if racism will ever end because it seems no matter how many years go by, it will live on forever? Luckily there are people in this world who are willing to fight for what is right just like Atticus Finch. In the To Kill a Mockingbird passage, in which Atticus ends the court case with a powerful statement where he is defending Tom Robinson, a black man in the southern state of Maycomb, Alabama, in the 1930s, Author Harper Lee uses irony and imagery to help develop the theme that the color of people’s skin does not define them as a person and does not automatically make them an awful and guilty person. To commence, Lee uses irony to establish the theme that one can not automatically be guilty because of the color of their …show more content…

As Atticus starts to get to the end of his …show more content…

Atticus, when trying to channel his points through to the jury uses imagery by noting, ‘“No code mattered to her before she broke it, but it came crashing down on her afterwards,’” (232). Which allows us to see that Mayella is cornered by the weight of her actions, kissing a black man. The point of Atticus’s final words are to make the jury believe that Tom Robinson is innocent and he strongly does that when he claims,’“...but there is circumstantial evidence to indicate that Mayella Ewell was beaten savagely by someone who led almost exclusively with his left,’” (232). This is significant because this imagery allows us as readers and also allows the jury to truly picture a man beating Mayella with their left hand. He also uses the strong word “savagely” allowing us to realize how badly she was beaten. Although, as we read through the court case we got informed that Tom robinson can not use his left hand because it is permanently injured from an accident in the past, but Bob Ewell is left handed and Atticus believes he believes he beat Mayella his own daughter because he was drunk. In the end, the imagery provided allows us to see so much on how Tom Robinson is innocent but in the end the jury still goes on to announce him guilty, and that will be because he is