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Banned Books In Mark Twain's The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn

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In a more sensitive society, like the one today, banned books are becoming more common. Typically the books aren’t banned by the government for having views that go against the state’s views, but they are, however, banned by smaller groups who view the book’s content as having “sexual explicitness, the use of offensive language, political incorrectness, and violence” (“Banned Books”). A popular example of a banned book is Mark Twain’s “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” The main reason Twain’s book is on the banned books list is do to the fact that it uses racial slurs (offensive language) such as “nigger” and its portrayal of Huck’s slave friend Jim (no longer politically correct). The book’s content is not racist but rather the time it takes place …show more content…

In large part, the focus on this period stems from the central and overwhelming importance of the slavery issue in national politics at this time. It was not until the 1830s that slaveholders fully embraced the defense of slavery as a ‘positive good’”("The Final Century of Slavery in the United States"). Since Huckleberry Finn takes place pre Civil War, around 1835-1845, this sets the story in a time where pro-slavery was beginning to push back against the abolishment of it, meaning that life for the slaves and African Americans as a whole would become much harder just as the story in question began since those who were wanting to keep slaves would begin to think that what they were doing was positive, and if it was a good thing in their mind, they would not care about a slave’s life if it meant they were doing a good deed for society, so why value it at all. That is why Twain wrote the word “nigger” 205 times, to emphasize that the time this is taking place is not good for somebody like Jim, not because the book was meant to be

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