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How To Kill A Mockingbird Social Standards

Decent Essays

In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird there are many examples of how social expectations, which is the social standard of what people should do and how they should act as well, changes the way people behave in society. This has been seen in society a lot in the past. Some examples in the story of this happening is seen with many different characters like Scout, Mr. Dolphus, Boo Radley, and The Cunninghams. All of these characters force themselves to act differently because of society’s expectations of them. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee argues that Social Expectations change the way people behave in society. One event that shows social expectations change the way people behave in society is when Mr. Dolphus has to pretend to be drunk so that people do not judge him because of his behavior. Also, Dolphus has to be judged by the other white males in town for the fact that he lives with a black woman. In chapter 20, Dolphus says, “‘Some folks don’t-like the way I live. Now I could say the hell with ‘em, I don’t care if they don’t like it’”(Lee 268). Due to the prejudice that existed during this time period, not everyone could be comfortable with who they …show more content…

For example, in the past, women were always expected to take care of children all day while men were expected to work at their jobs all day. These social expectations made society very different from how it is today. Not everyone could be what they wanted to be because of these social expectations. Thankfully, these social expectations of women and men have disappeared and anyone can be what they want to be. Though there are still some negative social expectations that exist today that have to do with race, gender, and age, the social expectations that forced women to take care of children and for men to work at their jobs all day was worse than social expectations today for

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