Essay Prejudice in To Kill A Mockingbird & Telephone Conversation
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The dictionary defines prejudice as a learned, preformed, and unsubstantiated judgment or opinion about an individual or a group, either favorable or unfavorable in nature. Through the study of the book, To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, and the poem Telephone Conversation by Wole Soyinka, ones understanding of prejudice and what makes up prejudice changes considerably for what could be perceived as for the better or for the worse. Being ignorant of what is happening or not knowing and properly understanding what prejudice is can make it easy to turn a blind eye to what is happening around you. Learning what prejudice is makes one more conscious of what is happening right next to you in everyday life. Being educated about prejudice is…show more content…
Her and her brother, Jeremy Atticus ‘Jem’ Finch were raised by their widowed father, Atticus, who had instilled in his children a strong sense of justice and ethics at an early age.
To Kill A Mockingbird, is an exceptional reflection of the attitudes and morals of the whites and blacks in the 1930’s. Suffering from the Great depression, the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, is divided, blacks or ‘negroes’ from whites. Both the black and the white community harbour ill thoughts about each other, their prejudices against one another blinding them of any reason or logic. In the book, it is stated that “In our courts, when its white man’s word against a black man’s, the white always wins. They’re ugly, but those are the facts of life.” Tom Robinson was a victim of a town where black men were inferior to white people who assumed that all negroes lie. Atticus Finch, a white man who is the black mans lawyer is not prejudiced against blacks like the rest of the town is. He attempts to persuade an already biased jury of white men to feel their sense of morality and ethics. As Kate Chopin said in The Awakening, Atticus is a fine example of, “The bird that would soar above the level plain of tradition and prejudice must have strong wings.” Atticus defies what all the other white townspeople believe is right by defending Tom Robinson. One is able to see and understand clearly, the prejudice amongst the townspeople that as a young child, Scout could not properly understand.
Her and her brother, Jeremy Atticus ‘Jem’ Finch were raised by their widowed father, Atticus, who had instilled in his children a strong sense of justice and ethics at an early age.
To Kill A Mockingbird, is an exceptional reflection of the attitudes and morals of the whites and blacks in the 1930’s. Suffering from the Great depression, the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, is divided, blacks or ‘negroes’ from whites. Both the black and the white community harbour ill thoughts about each other, their prejudices against one another blinding them of any reason or logic. In the book, it is stated that “In our courts, when its white man’s word against a black man’s, the white always wins. They’re ugly, but those are the facts of life.” Tom Robinson was a victim of a town where black men were inferior to white people who assumed that all negroes lie. Atticus Finch, a white man who is the black mans lawyer is not prejudiced against blacks like the rest of the town is. He attempts to persuade an already biased jury of white men to feel their sense of morality and ethics. As Kate Chopin said in The Awakening, Atticus is a fine example of, “The bird that would soar above the level plain of tradition and prejudice must have strong wings.” Atticus defies what all the other white townspeople believe is right by defending Tom Robinson. One is able to see and understand clearly, the prejudice amongst the townspeople that as a young child, Scout could not properly understand.
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The texts To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee, Amistad directed by Steven Spielberg and Telephone Conversation by Wole Soyinka explore the issue of racism. These three texts focus on prejudice, discrimination, bias, behaviour and attitude revolving around the issue of discrimination because of the coulour of ones skin and the cultural and social attitudes past on from one generation to another. Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel set in the southern states of the USA in the 1930’s, a time that
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