What Is The Theme Of Injustice In To Kill A Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird, a classic novel by Harper Lee, is a quintessential example of a novel that brings to light the social injustice that occurred throughout history. This social injustice is not only experienced by people of color, but also people that aren’t perceived as high class in society. Some people that face social injustice in To Kill a Mockingbird are the following: Tom Robinson, the Cunninghams, and Arthur Radley.

In Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, injustice is a main theme that is reflected towards many characters. To Kill a Mockingbird, is a novel written by Harper Lee and published in the nineteen-sixties. Many characters in the story are treated unfairly in society due to racial or prejudicial attitudes. Overall these characters are innocent victims of injustice. Atticus, Boo Radley, and Tom Robinson are considered to be mockingbirds in the novel. A mockingbird was defined as a bird that did nothing wrong, but sang beautiful music for us to hear. These characters did nothing wrong and were treated unfairly in their town. In this different society, there are many factors that have had an influence on people’s perceptions towards others.

What is justice? Is it a fitting punishment for a crime? Or a court or officer of the law? Is it the law itself? It has many definitions and interpretations, depending on various people. Some interpret it very simply, saying that it is fairness in every situation. Others give the word more complication, saying that it is doing what is morally right and fair. Oxford Dictionary defines it as many things, including, “Just behaviour or treatment...The quality of being fair and reasonable.” Black’s Law Dictionary defines justice as, “The constant and perpetual disposition to render every man his due.” All are various meanings and interpretations of one, single, word, that has been explored in many books and novels, including one by Harper Lee. In her novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee uses the characters of Atticus and Mr. Raymond to show the meaning of true justice and how it transcends prejudicial divisions.

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.

Race is the dominant cause of inequality in To Kill A Mockingbird, thus Maycomb’s views on race heavily influence every aspect of life. Although racial inequality is clearly illustrated in the in the injustice, prejudice, discrimination and antagonism surrounding the Tom Robinson trial, it is also shown more subtly throughout the novel. In chapter 25 Atticus Finch is quoted disclosing that the corrupt justice system is a direct cause of a racist society. “In our courts, when it's a white man’s word against a black man’s, the white man always wins” (Pg 295). To emphasize, on the same occasion Atticus attempts to explain to his children how widely spread racism is, “As you grow older, you’ll see white men cheat black men everyday of your life”

Recent protests and rallies have brought to light that discrimination plagues our society still today. When Discrimination and segregation was regularly practiced, Emmett Till was still young and lived in Chicago. Since Till lived in the north he was not exposed to the segregation he would soon experience in the south. His uncle and cousins were used to segregation because they lived in Mississippi. When he visited them one summer he would learn how truly terrifying discrimination could be. Till was only 14 when brutally murdered for “offending” a white woman, but from this brutality a new era of civil rights movements changed the world.

We are reminded of that history with every breath we take of injustice. The unfair treatment of blacks can mostly be attributed to lingering after effects of the end of the civil war and the bitter-sweet downfall of the confederacy. Violence that claims the pavement that we walk on and the lives of those who are our future. Poverty takes hold of the lives of the youth. The dehumanization of those who do not fit the social confines that have been drafted by those who try to crush the people they consider beneath them: It creates a new, invisible barrier that many choose to hold as the definitive disparity that cordially distinguishes the blacks from the

In Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, the author explores the issue of justice using the symbol of the mockingbird. Placed in, the 1930s, a time of great depression and inequality, the book presents injustice acts to the most kind yet blamed citizens of the town Maycomb. The symbolism of the mockingbird and the characters are essential for the message of Harper Lees novel because the kind, but African-American Tom Robinson is unfairly put on trial for the “rape” of Mayella Ewell. Also, Arthur “Boo” Radley is victimized by the rumors the towns people have created about him, forcing him to live alone inside his house with his brother, Nathan Radley. Lastly Atticus Finch, is known by the town for being a good human being and sticking

Through the study this term of the central text, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, and related texts, films Rabbit Proof Fence by Phillip Noyce and In the Name of the Father by Jim Sheridan, my understanding of the concept of justice, or what constitutes justice, has altered considerably. We all think we know what justice is, or what it should be. In Australian colloquial terms, it is the principle of a “fair go” for everyone. In a perfect world, everyone is treated fairly. No-one is subjected to discrimination on the basis of race, religion, ethnicity, sex or disability. But the reality is that the world we inhabit is far from perfect, human beings are by their very natures

In ‘To Kill a Mockingbird adversity is showed throughout the town especially through two different characters. Those characters may be on opposing sides in the courtroom but they both share a hard life, they are Mayella Ewell and Tom Robinson.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” - Martin Luther King Jr. The text To Kill a Mockingbird By Harper Lee, and the documentary “ The Untold Story of Emmett Till” directed by Keith Beauchamp both share the same opinions on justice and injustice in society. Harper Lee and the Untold story of Emmett Till are suggesting that injustice is created upon lies and guilt from others. We need to stop assumptions about other people because of their background and race. All things can come to good terms when people are treated fairly and equally because we are all humans.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Racism and injustice usually coincide with each other in the world. Most forms of injustice are conceived by racism, which has derived from a long past of prejudice among humans. Racism has been found in literature for years now but it is more for education and a hope for evading racism in the future rather than for entertainment. Harper Lee shows racism in her book “To Kill A Mockingbird” by leading to the eventual death of a seemingly innocent man who was wrongfully convicted guilty by a biased jury.

Justice seems to be nowhere in the world. People are treated dastardly all the time for terrible reasons everyday, and this si no new thing. Harper Lee’s renowned book To Kill a Mockingbird shows many cases of social injustice in the small town of MAycomb, Alabama in the 1930’s. The novel is told through the eyes of Scout, a young girl learning many lessons as she grows up (facing adversity??). As Scout learns lessons so does the reader. In To Kill a Mockingbird the theme people treat others differently because of social class demonstrated by Maycomb's citizens’ way of life to show the necessity of fighting for justice by Aunt Alexandria’s judgemental nature, Atticus’ defense of the truth, and Scout’s understanding.

Although adults often seem more powerful or knowledgeable than a child, the opposite presumes true in Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. The novel describes the life of a naive child named Scout who lives in a small-minded town in the south with her brother and dad. Scout and Jem start to lose their innocence when Atticus, their father, defends a black man at court bringing light to the effects of racism. Children have the characteristic of innocence which is very powerful as because of it, the narrator is deemed believable, the harsh effects of injustice are exposed and corrupt adults can open their minds to receive Lee’s message on the grim reality of the racism and wrongdoings of the south.

The fight for the abolition of slavery was a big battle but the one for racial segregation was a bitter one. “Race should not be a source of power or advantage or disadvantage for anyone in a free society” (Steele, page509). It is quite difficult to understand that America a nation of freedom, liberty and opportunities could have allowed some people to be oppressed. Even in the court of law the injustice persisted. “Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts” (Letter from a Birmingham Jail).