Kill A Mockingbird By Harper Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee has been banned and/or challenged over thirty times since its publication in 1960. Effectively preventing many students from enjoying the novel and benefitting from its message. To ignore racism is no different than denying it ever existed. To Kill a Mockingbird is appropriate for mature adolescence/students and should not be banned from schools. Despite its sexual related content, or profanity, a valuable lesson remains that should be taught to students.

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee has many ongoing themes such as Walking in Someone Else 's Shoes, Social Classes, Scout 's Maturity, and Boo Radley. These themes contribute to the story in many ways.

Imagine a place where the verdict of a rape trial stems from racial prejudice rather than the proper evaluation of proven evidence. This is Maycomb, Alabama, the strange, Southern town where Scout and Jem Finch grow up during the 1930s in the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. In short, the novel travels a thin line between a light-hearted narrative of the siblings’ childhood with their single father, a defense attorney named Atticus Finch, and the injustices that arise within their close-knit community. The complexities include extreme racism, a peculiar social hierarchy, and general misunderstandings of certain people within the small town. These are all seen as “Maycomb ways”, almost as if they are considered facts. Through her writing, Lee conveys an important message that an essential part of a child’s education often takes place in a home or community rather than a classroom by utilizing the characters, Atticus Finch and Tom Robinson, a black man accused of rape whom Atticus is defending.

Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, is the story of two children coming of age and learning about their hometown and the whole world. The two children in the story are Jem and Scout Finch. Jem and Scout live with their father, Atticus, in Maycomb County. Throughout the story, many problems arise which teach both children about bravery. The three bravest characters in the novel include their neighbor Mrs. Dubose, a convicted black man named Tom Robinson, and their father Atticus.

We live in a society where African Americans used to be treated with no respect. What if you had to experience the same things that they dealt with? They faced racial discrimination and injustice in court. Mostly in the Jim Crow South, certain groups of white people during this time made it impossible for African Americans to receive justice. Even if they were innocent, blacks could be brutally punished and were subjugated by violence. In court whites would generally win even if they did not have any strong evidence to support their arguments. Especially in the south, during the 1930s, African Americans had little value and basically no legal status in society. They were meant to be treated like animals and, generally, many people believed that whites were always superior to blacks.

She begins to understand the underlying racism issues in her community. Scout comprehends the severity and injustice around the black community and the trial. Her stances and morals often differ from those in Maycomb. She begins to question the ethnicty of her own family ‘ “ Well how do you know we ain’t negroes” “ Uncle Jack Finch says we really don’t know. He says as far as he can trace back the finches ain’t but for all he knows we mighta come straight out of Ethiopia” ’(216). As Scout grows, she becomes intrigued with learning about the minority in Maycomb. Compartitvely, Scout displays maturity when she increasingly begins to develop and interest in no longer wearing her boyish overalls but preferably, joining her aunt in a more lady-like environment. “ I carefully picked up the tray and watched myself walk to Mrs. Merriweather, with my best company manners, I asked her if she would have some. After all if Aunty could be a lady at a time like this, so could I” (318). The arrangements that Scout had previously deemed boring, soon became absorbing and engaging. Scout begins to paint an ideal image of a young

Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird says, “I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what” (Lee 149). Atticus is the best example of what courage is this book for three major reasons. First, he is a single parent, secondly he defended Tom Robinson, and finally because he was willing to spare Mr. Arthur suffering by allowing his son, Jem, to take the responsibility of Mr. Bob Ewell’s Death.

“‘...Mockingbirds… don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us [anyone and everyone in Maycomb]. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird…’” (Lee 119). In the Pulitzer Prize winning novel of 1961 To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee tells the story of a young girl by the name of Jean Louise (Scout) Finch and her older brother Jeremy Atticus (Jem) Finch, and what their lives were like growing up in Maycomb, Alabama during 1933-35. Scout and her brother Jem are both children of the morally passionate lawyer, Atticus Finch, and both are exposed to the same experiences that shape their sense of right and wrong. Yet Scout and Jem come to dramatically different conclusions about good and evil and the essential nature of humankind.

This book is a story that revolves around a girl named Scout Finch. Scout has a brother named Jem, a father named Atticus, and a friend named Dill. The characters live during the 1930s in a town in the southern United States called Maycomb that is filled with drama, racism, and mean old women. In the story, “To Kill A Mockingbird” by Harper Lee, there is a girl named Scout who acts as the narrator of the story. The key events in the story are about either Scout’s childhood, or about Atticus’s job as a lawyer, who had to defend a black man named Tom Robinson against a white woman who claims that she was harassed by Tom. In the end, Boo Radley helps Jem and Scout after they are attacked by Bob Ewell. The three main characteristics in the

The saying “Life isn’t fair” is always right. No matter fair something seems, there is always something just about, no matter how small it is. In To Kill a Mockingbird, a young man named Tom Robinson is sentenced to death because of his race. Even though all of the evidence backs him up, he is still found guilty because he is African American. This happens because of all the prejudice that the people of Maycomb possess. Throughout To Kill a Mockingbird, author Harper Lee depicts her views on prejudice and how it affects society. Harper Lee asserts that the amount of prejudice someone receives is dependent on one’s race and gender, and that to overcome prejudice one must become acquainted with many different groups of people.

In To Kill A MockingBird, Injustice is detracted in the lifestyle of everyday lives of coloured folks in the town of Maycomb, Alabama. The segregation; distribution of resources; the pursuit of happiness are clearly demonstrated in the town of Maycomb, Alabama. The time area is during the Great Depression (Lee), the folks in Maycomb, was a small community with interesting people that keeps the town lively.

“As I often say, we have come a long way from the days of slavery, but in 2014, discrimination and inequality still saturate our society in modern ways. Though racism may be less blatant now in many cases, its existence is undeniable,” Al Sharpton once said. Racism and classism are prevalent motifs that existed more prominently in the past, and continue to exist in the present. Harper Lee elaborates on this universal idea in her novel, To Kill a Mockingbird which is about the protagonist, Jean Louise Finch, Scout for short, and her childhood which takes place in the somnolent Southern town of Maycomb County, Alabama. The novel talks about the crisis of conscience and race that rocked the fictional town of Maycomb during the Great

The 1960’s text To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee is a classic novel in modern American literature. In the novel Lee addresses many key issues in our past society but many of those are still occurring today such as racism, inhumanity, violence, gender inequality and justice. The story is told through the eyes of a 6 year old girl, Scout Finch. Scout lives with her father, Atticus, a lawyer; her older brother Jem; and their Negro cook, Calpurnia. Lee uses Scout to express the story in a way that allows the reader to connect with the story. The audience becomes close to Scout. Her innocence, loyalty and forgiveness of the world’s injustices make her character endearing and easy to relate too. Lee uses Scout to view the text in a relatable way. This is an effective way to draw the reader to this novel.

“Racism is man’s greatest threat to man- the maximum of hatred for a minimum of reason”- Abraham Joshua Heschel. This quote by Mr. Heschel perfectly summarizes the amount of pure racism that was present in the southern United States, all because millions of people believed in one false statement, that separate was equal. The intriguing novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, is written by the prestigious author Harper Lee. In this novel, she has utilized the lifestyle and attitudes toward “African Americans” in the 1930’s to create a novel which presents the reader with Lee’s attitudes and personal values, as the novel appears to be autobiographical to her days as a child. The racism that is apparent and a focal point in the novel is, although fiction, closely matched to that of a racist era in America, during the 1930’s, also known as the Great Depression. The effects of the Great Depression hit virtually every group of Americans. Sadly, African Americans were hit the hardest. Already by 1932, half of the black Americans were forced out of their job, and racial violence soon became more common. Lynchings in the South went up 75% from 1932 to 1933. These hardships experienced during the Great Depression were also represented in the town of Maycomb, Alabama. Jem and Scout Finch, in a town corrupt with people believing false assumptions, try to show their understanding towards the negroes, with the help of their father, Atticus. During that time, the case of a young black man being

The text type of To Kill a Mockingbird is a fiction novel which deals with the racism the author observed as a child in her hometown of Monroeville, Alabama. To Kill a Mockingbird was written by Harper Lee, who wrote her novel in a retrospective point of view. There were numerous aspects of historical, personal, cultural and social context in To Kill a Mockingbird. Harper Lee was born on the 28th of April, 1926, in Monroeville Alabama. Monroeville was a close-knit community that has many similarities with Maycomb, which is the setting of To Kill a Mockingbird. Harper Lee’s father was a prominent lawyer, whom she drew inspiration for the protagonists father, Atticus Finch. Among Lee’s childhood friends was Truman Capote, from whom she drew inspiration to the character Dill. These personal details help portray Harper Lee’s own childhood home, where racism and segregation was highly evident. Another example of context which helped shape To Kill a Mockingbird were the events that occurred during Harper Lee’s childhood. In 1931, when Harper Lee was five years old, nine African-American men were accused of raping two white women near Scottsboro, Alabama. After a series of lengthy, highly publicised, and often bitter trials, five of the nine men were sentenced to long term imprisonment. Many prominent lawyers and various members of the general public saw the sentences as spurious and believed that it was motivated by racial prejudice.