Theme Of Racism In To Kill A Mockingbird

In the story “To Kill A Mockingbird” by Harper Lee, the main character Scout realizes the town she lives in is full of bias and prejudice toward negros. Scout, the only daughter of lawyer Atticus Finch, is faced with the activism that follows this prejudice when her father decides to defend a negro, Tom Robinson, in the court of law. She is constantly harassed and tormented by the residence of their small town, Maycom. What Lee is trying to show through these events is that people are always going to have prejudices, and sometimes these prejudices come from the people you least expect it form. In the story, neighbors, friends, and family all show their prejudices about the defendant Tom Robinson to Scout, who finally realize the world isn’t perfect but is, in fact, full of flaws and prejudices.

The setting of the book To Kill A Mockingbird has a huge role on the conflicts, outcome of the trial, and Jem and Scout’s development. The book takes place in Maycomb county Alabama, in the 1930’s during the Great Depression. Since Alabama is in the south, and was before the Civil Rights Movement, most of the white residents in the town were racist. In the book, the town of Maycomb is almost like a character on its own. It is a small town that had lots of farmers who were struck hard by the Great Depression. Scout, who is the narrator of the book describes it by saying, “Maycomb was a tired old town, but it was a tired old town when I first knew it. In rainy weather the streets turned to red slop; grass grew on the sidewalks, the courthouse sagged in the square”(Lee 6). Scout even goes on to say, “People moved slowly then. They ambled across the square, shuffled in and out of the stores around it, took their time about everything”(Lee 6). In the novel To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, the conflict of racism is shown through the trial, Atticus, and Jem and Scout’s uprising in a non-racist home but in a prejudice town.

Imagine being persecuted your entire life. Having to constantly respect someone even though they were rude to you. This is what many African-Americans had to go through during the 1930’s. Racism is a major aspect in the novel To Kill a Mockingbird. The main character, Scout, has to deal with this problem everyday. Bob Ewell, Mr. Cunningham, and other characters are very racist, and don’t approve of Atticus defending a “Negroe”. This causes Scout to be bullied in school and even attacked by Mr. Ewell. Also, characters such as Tom Robinson are negatively affected by racism in Maycomb. Tom is killed just because of his skin color. In the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee’s use of point-of-view, irony, and symbolism help to develop

Decades ago, in the 1930s, people of color were not treated fairly. Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird took place in the 1930s in the fictional place of Macomb County, Alabama. It was narrated through a young girl named Scout Finch. Throughout the novel, Scout, her older brother, Jem, and their good friend Dill discover realities of society. Scout and Jem’s father, Atticus, was appointed to be the attorney of a black man. Because of the time period, the case was almost hopeless, but Atticus fought anyway. Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird displays universal themes such as racial intolerance and innocence of youth.

There are many themes shown throughout the book To Kill a Mockingbird. The author, Harper Lee made the novel take place in the 1930s and in a fictional town called Maycomb County in Alabama. The narrator was a young girl in the novel names Scout Finch. Throughout the book Scout, her older brother Jem, and her best friend Dill discover new things and become more mature. Then towards the end of the book Atticus, the father of Jem and Scout, agrees to defend a black man named Tom Robinson, who is accused of raping a white girl. In the book To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, racial intolerance and courage are two of the many themes demonstrated throughout the novel.

In Harper Lee’s classic, To Kill A Mockingbird, “Tom was a dead man the minute Mayella Ewell opened her mouth and screamed” (Lee, 245). As To Kill A Mockingbird takes place in the 1930’s, for a white woman to accuse a man of color of committing a crime would mean that the man has been declared guilty before they are given a chance to defend themselves, leading to false convictions. Even if they were to be given the chance to try to save themselves from an unjust verdict, the juries normally consisted of white men, consequently leading to an inevitable conviction. With Tom Robinson being a black man and Mayella Ewell being a white woman, this was the reality for Tom when he was accused of raping Mayella. With this accusation, it became very clear who exactly had been infected with “Maycomb’s usual disease”(Lee, 91) especially Bob Ewell, Mayella’s father. Racism and injustice are both heavy influences in To Kill A Mockingbird as the story takes place in 1930 where many white people had racist views towards people of color, giving white people a higher status in Maycomb County, Alabama, thus giving them more power than people of color. This played a large role in one of the bigger conflicts in the story with Bob Ewell and Tom Robinson as the two men hold to different social statuses showing everyone their true colors. Throughout the novel we are presented with numerous quotes showing how Tom Robinson and Mr. Bob Ewell acted before the trial and how the trial has showed us what their true intentions are.

Living in 2017, many people believe America is free of racism and prejudice. That it is past the years of wrongfully convicting African-American men and past an unfair judicial system. People believe equality for all is really happening. Yet, studies show that innocent black men are seven times more likely to be convicted of murder than innocent white people. Another study shows that even though black people represent only 13% of the US population they represent 47% of 1,900 exonerations from 1989 to mid-October of 2016. In the book To Kill a Mockingbird, author Harper Lee shows us that racism and fear are often more powerful than justice and morality. Three characters who understand this injustice include Atticus Finch, Bob Ewell, and Tom

In the book To Kill a Mockingbird, many minor themes are present such as gender and age. However, the largest and therefore major theme of the book is racism. All of the events and themes in the book had only one purpose, to support the theme of racism.

“There’s something in our world that makes men lose their heads- they couldn’t be fair if they tried. In our courts, when it’s a white man’s word against a black man’s word, the white always wins. They’re ugly, but these are the facts of life.” ************ Along with the main theme of the story, racism, there are multiple other themes that are represented in the story. These include: the coexistence of good and evil, and importance of mortal education. The use of the “mockingbird” symbolizes innocence in the main characters, Boo Radley, Tom Robinson, and Scout because of the social issues within the society in the 1930’s.

The theme I chose to write was racism in “To Kill a Mockingbird”. Racism is the belief in which ethnic groups account for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others. This belief has been a part of the human race ever since people are born, racism is slowly fading, but people cannot that say all do not express it. There are still some who believe one's ethnicity and appearance change everything in that particular person. In Harper Lee's novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, the town's people of Maycomb misjudge African-Americans. They treat them like trash, and through some people's eyes, African-Americans are just filthy beings. In this novel, Lee expresses one's ethnicity and appearance change other's opinions about a certain character, without knowing the character's personality and beliefs. “Harper Lee is against racism in To Kill a Mockingbird.”

Social inequality with race mostly affects people who don’t deserve it. To Kill A Mockingbird is a book written by Harper Lee based on the depression era. The story is told from the perspective of a girl named Scout. This story describes the ugliness of race, murder, injustice, prejudice, and gender. One of the themes of To Kill A Mockingbird is racism. Racism was a very large part of society in the south during the Depression era. Whites were considered better than African Americans were, and most white people accepted the fact that their society was that way. Many of the characters in To Kill a Mockingbird were affected by racial discrimination, including Calpurnia, Scout, Jem, Atticus and Tom Robinson and his family. Throughout the book, racism is illustrated through, communities, households and the legal system.

This essay will be covering the book To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Specifically, it will be talking about a certain theme that shows up quite a bit throughout the book. The theme that will be discussed is racism. Racism shows up quite a bit throughout the book in many different ways.

To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee is set in Maycomb County, Alabama in the 1930s, during the Great Depression. It is a time of racism, opinionated communities, and poverty. Scout and Jem Finch face several conflicts throughout the novel and are forced to mature quickly. Atticus Finch, the father of Jem and Scout, also faces a major difficulty which will affect his family and the town he lives in.

“‘Please don’t send me back, please sir’” (Lee 33) pleaded Scout to her father Atticus. She had just come home from her first day at school with a teacher named Miss Caroline who was also new to the school, as well as to all of Maycomb, a little town in Alabama that Scout Finch lives in. Miss Caroline has been taught a standardized way to teach, which has students writing in second grade, not first, and when she discovers that Scout already knows how to read and write, she grows furious. When Scout goes home and tells this to Atticus, Atticus has Scout attempt to empathise with Miss Caroline, and, “‘climb into [her] skin and walk around in it’” (Lee 33). Scout begins to understand that Miss Caroline had a rough day too, and Scout and

"This case is as simple as black and white," (271). Atticus Finch is very smart and selective with his words. As time passed, it was easy to see why this quote was so important to the theme of the novel. When Atticus was appointed to defend Mr. Tom Robinson, it caused a major shakeup to the county and his family. The Finch's were often met with hostility and antagonism from others, but they rarely fought back at these people. Although this case could be very damaging to the lives of himself and his children, Atticus knows that he has to defend this innocent black man from his alleged crime. Many of the folks in Maycomb county are furious at Mr. Finch for even agreeing to give an effort to help a colored man because they are racist. In To Kill a Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee, it is clear to see that the author used certain characters, such as Jem, Atticus, and Scout, to address the complex conflict of racism in the novel.