What is an outsider? According to Merriam-Webster, an outsider is a person who does not belong to a particular group. Most people are outright judgmental in all societies judging on their own characteristics, actions, cultures, and standards. In the South around the 1930s countless people, African Americans especially, were targets of judgement and harassment on what they could not control about themselves or how they chose to live. In Harper Lee's novel To Kill a Mockingbird, the people of Maycomb had a genuine fear of the unknown and the outsiders of the story are subjected to suspicion and ridicule. There are frequent outsiders in the novel, nevertheless some jumped out and taught you something about how to live and what's important in life; these characters include Arthur Radley, Scout, and Mayella Ewell.
Arthur Radley is an outsider to the rest of the community of Maycomb for two reasons. For example, Arthur Radley has many stories and legends surrounding him and his family. His family is a very quiet family that likes their privacy and avoids the outside world. The legends say that his father made him stay indoors. The children and people of Maycomb do not see him as a citizen in their town they see him as a monster and connect him to feelings of fear. "Boo was about six-and-a-half feet tall, judging from his tracks; he dined on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch, that's why his hands were bloodstained – if you ate an animal raw, you could never wash the blood
Everyone in Maycomb believes that the Radleys are dangerous and no one dares to really talk to them. They don’t follow the unwritten social rules that everyone else follows, and that is weird and mysterious to people. The community is mostly suspicious of Arthur Radley, also known as Boo Radley. People believe he is hostile because when he was a teen, he got in with the wrong crow and was arrested. Fifteen years later, he had another incident.
Outsiders: Misunderstood or Misjudged? Outsiders, defined as a person who does not belong to a particular group. The bigger question is: What qualifies them as an outsider? Or how does one determine that this “outsider” really is different from everyone else? Do we get to know this person before we provide them with the title or do we simply give it to them based on the way we view them from afar?
“[Boo Radley] dined on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch, that's why his hands were bloodstained--if you ate an animal raw, you could never wash the blood off...” (Lee 16), a child frighteningly whispers about the town “monster”, Boo Radley. In, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Arthur “Boo” Radley is a misunderstood adult of whom the entire town is scared of, even though he does not come out of his house. However, when he does come out of the house, he commits a courageous deed that ends up with the Finch Kids, Jem and Scout, indebted to him. Boo Radley is a positive citizen in the town of Maycomb because of his incredible feat of bravery for the children.
Fear of the unknown prompts Maycomb society to fabricate false rumors about Boo Radley and by doing so, isolate him as an outcast. The Radley family is different from the other families in Maycomb society as they do not follow the accepted traditions of the townspeople: “The Radleys...kept to themselves, a predilection unforgivable in Maycomb...The shutters and doors of the Radley house were always closed on Sundays, another thing alien to Maycomb ways” (9). By describing the Radleys as “alien”, Lee reveals the extent to which the family is unknown to Maycomb. Since their customs are unusual of a Maycomb family, they are distanced from the rest of society, thus making them even more mysterious and alien to the townspeople. However, this is just the beginning for a string of unexplainable and incomprehensible actions concerning the Radleys. After an incident with the law, the son Arthur Radley “was not seen again for fifteen years” until one day he “drove his scissors into his parent’s leg…[and] Mrs. Radley ran screaming into the street that Arthur was killing them all”, a rumor spread by the town gossip (10-11). The first event scares the townspeople as they cannot understand why a person would associate with bad influences and commit such acts of violence in disregard of the law. Also, being locked
What does being outsider mean? Does it mean being left out of being different? People have often felt like an outsider at one point in their life, and wonder why. Are outsiders misjudged or misunderstood? These two terms meet at a crossroads, and are commonly misinterpreted. Misjudging someone is when you make a solid assumption or conclusion about them, whether it be on their looks our how they act. Being misunderstood is when someone interprets you for someone you are not. Based on both of these definitions, outsiders are simply misjudged. We can see examples of outsiders being misjudged both in literature and in modern day society.
Remember in Junior High and High School when there were groups of different people? Like the football, basketball and cheerleaders hang out in a big group, but in the other corner there are the gamers, the book smart kids and then the others that don’t fit in. So now I am asking you as a reader, what do you think? Are outsiders simply those who are misjudged or misunderstood? In my opinion, I think that the outsiders are both misunderstood and misjudged.
An outsider can be a person who does normally not fit in with the people around them, acknowledging that they are unique and special in their own way. Another way an outsider can be looked at as is “a person not belonging to a particular group, set, party, etc.” (Dictionary.com). With there being different meanings to the word outsider an actual outsider can be timid and absent to the people around them or they can be outspoken and persistent by any means necessary.
Arthur Radley experiences social prejudice throughout the novel, hence, he is marginalised by the people of Maycomb. He is firstly portrayed as a mysterious character through the rumours of the towns. On pg9 various sentences such as, “Inside the house lived a malevolent phantom. People said he existed but Jem and I had never seen him. People said he went out at night when the moon was high and peeped in windows. When people’s azaleas froze in a cold snap, it was
What is an outsider? An outsider is a person who is not excepted by or is isolated by society. Have you ever been an “outsider”? Everyone experiences a situation where they weren’t able to fit in. The feeling of not being able to fit it is universal. Not everyone is the same and in certain situations you may not be able to bond with everyone. Everyone is focused on being judged or being the person who is judging someone. If you are not like everyone in your society group, those people don’t except you. Nowadays our society feels that if you aren’t up to people’s expectations, you are known to be an “outsider”. Being an outsider is universal because not everyone is social, not everyone can afford nice things and not everyone is popular.
2. Arthur Radley, or “Boo Radley”, the son of Mr. Radley is a distant, lonely, isolated man who isn’t ever seen by people outside his house. People in Maycomb perceive him as an awful person, with a terrifying appearance who fills them with aghast.
One example of an outsider would be Gregor in the famous story “The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka. In this story, there are numerous examples of Gregor being misjudged and Gregor feeling misunderstood. The first example is how people view Gregor as a traveling salesman. “People don't like traveling salesmen. I know that. People think they earn pots of money and thus lead a fine life. People don't even have any special reason to think through this judgment more clearly” (Kafka, 148). In this quote, you can clearly see that people are misjudging Gregor because he is a traveling salesman. In the text, Gregor feels that he is misunderstood because none of these people know that Gregor has to work as a traveling salesman not because he wants to, but because he has to pay off his family's debt. Another example is how Gregor’s family assumes things about what he would or would not do. “But how can it be Gregor? If it
An outsider is defined as “a person who does not belong to a particular group.” In the book, The Outsiders, many of the characters can be described as being an outcast from the social society. Ponyboy, Johnny, and Cherry are outsiders in this novel because none of them really fit into the groups that they’re “supposed” to be in.
Arthur “Boo” Radley is a man who was involved in a gang when he was young. Now he is seen as an insane and murderous person by the town. People rumor him to walk around at night and peer in people's windows and eat squirrels and cats.
“Being an outsider means not being heard, not having a voice. It means being treated as a second-class citizen, being diminished in the eyes of others. We have all felt this way at one time or another, but some feel it more consistently.” This quote said by the American novelist, Chris Crutcher. Just as most of society agrees, the experience of being an outsider is universal. Numerous short stories and other works demonstrate the act of being an outsider. Works such as The Doll’s House by Katherine Mansfield, shows the knowledge of actually being an outsider in reality, The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, shows the know-how of merely feeling like an outsider, and Fences by Pat Mora shows how parents can influence if you are or are not an outsider.
First, there are several types of outsider based on different reasons. A person who decides to take himself away from the society, or one who different from most people can be said to be an outsider. a person not belonging to a particular group, set, party, etc. An outsider can also mean someone who is not within boundary or enclosure. “a person not belonging to a particular group, set, party, etc.” (OutsiderDictionary.com. Web. Pg.1). Though the dictionary has already described what an outsider meant, an outsider can also be when one is trying really hard to succeed at a particular thing but is having difficulty doing that; like in the case of a student who is having difficulty in passing a course while most of the students seem to be having no problem with the class. Such student can be said to be an outsider. While this is the case for students, a homeless is said to be an outsider too.