The first influence on Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird is the Jim Crow laws. The Jim Crow laws were a set of rules that perpetuated racism and segregation. These rules were sickening and appalling. The Jim Crow laws were made to keep Blacks from interacting with Whites. For example, if a white woman were to fall a black man could not offer her, his hand to help her up because it was considered rape (Pilgrim 2). Many scientists and religious leaders justified these laws. One reason was that scientist thought that black peoples brains were inferior to those of white people. Also, many religious leaders believed that Whites were the chosen people and Blacks were just there to serve them (Pilgrim 2). If you were not following these laws, there were sever consequences. People believed these punishments were necessary to “keep Blacks in their place”. One example is mass lynching. This punishment is when a mob of people would take a black person, accused of breaking a rule, and beat them, torture them, and kill them. The police didn’t just not stop these rampages, often they would participate. The Jim Crow laws can be seen in To Kill a Mockingbird in many ways. One of the laws was that a black person could not say that a white person was lying (Pilgrim). This is shown in the book when Tom is accused of calling Mayella a liar, by Mr. Gilmer (Lee 224).
Another influence that helped Harper Lee write To Kill a Mockingbird was mob mentality. The concept of mob mentality is a
The first influence on Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird is the Jim Crow laws. The Jim Crow laws are laws that were set to restrict Blacks, these laws were considered a way of life (Pilgrim). People thought that these laws were necessary because craniologists, eugenicists, phrenologists, and Social Darwinists at every level believed that Blacks were intellectually inferior (Pilgrim). Punishments would be dealt out for any reason, such as breaking Jim Crow laws, and alleged criminal offenses (Pilgrim). Some typical punishments were physical beatings and lynchings. The Jim Crow laws are seen throughout To Kill a Mockingbird. One Jim Crow law mandated Whites did not have to use courtesy titles when referring to Blacks. Thus
The novel To Kill a Mockingbird is a book of fiction, but we know that some major historical events like the Scottsboro case and the Jim Crow laws were reflected in this novel. The author Harper Lee could not have ignored the Jim Crow Laws and the Scottsboro trial as she was in her childhood when all of these injustices and racism happened. In her novel, Harper Lee reflects on the Scottsboro case by changing people who were involved in this case with fictional characters. The Jim Crow laws influenced Harper Lee in To Kill a Mockingbird and she reflects about that by showing the whites racist attitude toward the black people and their injustices in court.
Harper Lee protests the Jim Crow Laws in To Kill A Mockingbird by having Atticus defend a black man in court. Atticus defends a black man in court during the time the Jim Crow Laws surfaced.In the Jim Crow Laws, a black man should never accuse a white person of lying. Also, the Jim Crow Laws separate blacks and whites from interacting. Atticus and Tom Robinson go against this by having a case to defend
What impact did the Jim Crow laws have on blacks and what rights did they violated as illustrated in the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird? The Jim Crow laws significantly impacted the population between the whites and blacks with the most important law of separation for public transportation and public facilities. According to “Jim Crow Laws and Racial Segregation,” “Beginning in the 1880s, the term Jim Crow was used as a reference to practices, laws, or institutions related to the physical separation of black people from white people” (1). The rights that the Jim Crow laws violated were the whites desire to have control over the blacks. In addition, this violation created advantages for the whites to have a peaceful atmosphere and caused the blacks to suffer from racial inequality. Lee demonstrated in her Southern Gothic and Bildungsroman novel, To Kill a Mockingbird issues that significantly impacted the Jim Crow laws in society which were class, gender
To Kill A Mockingbird is a novel with demonstrations of many unfair things. One example of these unfair things is the demonstration of the Jim Crow Laws in action. The Jim Crow Laws were the laws that allowed segregation between whites and blacks. These laws could deny blacks education, jobs, and transportation. They completely violated the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments. White people tried to defend this by saying that blacks were more likely to commit crimes
Atticus Finch once said, “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view-until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.” (Lee, 39) In the book To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee used factual events as an inspiration for her novel. There are links to the Jim Crow laws, Mob Mentality, and racism.
Huck and Scout find themselves in the center of two societies that are welcoming to racism. Huck’s world takes place during a time before slavery was illegal and looked down upon. Slaves were everywhere in his home of the south and was seen as a part of life. He was surrounded by adults who owned slaves, accepted slavery, and were racist. His own father had been a racist man who looked down on African Americans as worthless trash. Because of the adults in his life had treated and viewed them in this way, Huck thought this was how it is. He viewed slaves as property and not much more than this. However, when Huck met Jim after running away from his abusive father, he seemed to have not been fully influenced from the racist adults he spent his
How would you feel if you lived in a town where everyone discriminates you because of your color and treats you different only because your different and do you think that it would be fair to you and those around you? People these days believe that they have more power than others because they look different if they were put in there shoes they wouldn’t think the same and you wouldn’t too. Some people thinks that black man doesn’t compare with white men and they think they shouldn’t have any power when the truth is there is nothing truly different between them. The characters in TKAM live in a diverse community where blacks are different from whites in not the best ways. In that community they experience racism towards the people around them and sometimes to themselves as well. People in TKAM treat other people differently based on there color no matter what the situation is the white man always has more power than colored.
In our society today the racism cannot compare to the racism and prejudice that African American’s had to face throughout the 1800’s and on. This topic is a prominent point in the development of To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. This book focuses on the hardships of a young girl, Scout, during the years of the depression. Her family is greatly impacted by specific laws set out for coloured people called the “Jim Crow Laws”. Throughout a trial that her father is involved in, we see the rights that are violated when it comes to black people.
“To Kill A Mockingbird” has many big ideas throughout the story that have to do with justice, being prejudice, and courage. The word prejudice is one of the key ideas throughout the story because in many examples characters in the story have a preconceived opinion towards many different ideas. Another big idea in the story is justice. Justice has to do with being fair, however in many cases throughout the book people are treated anything but fairly. And lastly, courage played a major part in the lives of many characters throughout the story. In the story,”To Kill A Mockingbird,” by Harper Lee, it states that it states that people from the 1930’s had many problems to deal with regarding being prejudice and having justice, however Scout and many
Racism is bad now but imagine it in the 1930’s. The novel To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, shows what can happen when racism is involved in the world. A southern town called Maycomb, Alabama is suffering through the Great Depression. A six year old girl, Scout Finch, tells the story about her family and growing up in Maycomb. Her father, Atticus is an attorney trying to prove a black man innocent of raping a white woman, but the trial runs on.
In to Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Jim Crow laws supported segregation and racist attitudes in Maycomb County Alabama.
The Jim Crow Laws were made to enforce segregation. In To Kill A Mockingbird, there is lots of segregation. White people have their part of the town and black people have theirs. White people have their opinions and black people have theirs. It never talked about the Jim Crow Laws specifically, but you could definitely see examples of them.
Mohdia Ibrahim Ibrahim 1 Sr. Aliyah English 9 Honors 12 November 2014 In the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, there were many different themes and characteristics shown through the characters.
Even in communities today people show prejudice towards others only based of how they dress, what their hair looks like, and even what skin color they are. Instead of getting to know the person they just assume what they are like, so they do not even bother going over and trying to get to know them. In Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Maycomb suffers from an unusual disease, racism, that causes people to behave differently in order to fit in with their culture. Therefore, racism affects the behavior of others as seen with how Maycomb views and treats Dolphus due to his close connection to the colored community.