DIN: Do It Now

How do you define integrity and do you

have it?

To Kill a Mockingbird

Introductory Information

Author Harper Lee• Born (and raised) in Monroeville

Alabama, 1926 • Descendant of General Robert Lee

(commander of the confederate army during the civil war)

• Went to law school in Alabama, but never finished; briefly lived in NYC

• 1961: won the Pulitzer Prize, among other awards, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, highest national civilian award

• Parallels exist between her own life and events in the book: Her father is the model for Atticus Finch, and the trial is based on a real life event as well.

Birmingham*-MLK Letter

Montgomery-Rosa Parks

Lynchings were popular activities

While Lee was writing TKAM…

Segregation was still prevalent

African American Leaders emerged and people began to question and challenge the persisting racial ideologies.

Integration Famous pictures of Little Rock Nine

1957

Other Important Events The 1960s

• Man on the moon• Woodstock• Jackie Robinson• Vietnam War begins• Kent State Tragedy • Marilyn Monroe dies• Martin Luther King Jr.’s march on

Washington and assassination• JFK: 1st Roman Catholic President

The Setting of Lee’sbook is the 1930s.

*Note: The Civil War began in 1861, but 100years later, African Americans were stilloppressed.

What we know about the 1930s:

• Population: 123 million in 48 states • Life Expectancy: Male, 58.1; Female, 61.6 • Average salary: $1,368• Unemployment at 25%, (average=5%); proposal

of a guaranteed annual income of $2,500 • Car Sales: 2,787,400 • Food Prices: Milk, 14 cents a qt.; Bread, 9 cents a

loaf; Round Steak, 42 cents a pound • WHAT ELSE?

Images from the Great Depression

Sign reads “ Line for restaurant…I will feed 20

Unemployment lines

A home during the Great Depression

A Town of Shanties

One of the most famous images from the G.D.

…The Great Depression was especially hard on southerners because many people left rural areas in hopes to find work and prosperity in larger cities.

*Pause for Questions

Era, Setting, Environment

Of and within TKAM • Small town of Maycomb

Alabama, 1933-1935 • Great Depression, which

began in 1929, with the stock market crash, and lasted through the 1930s. *essentially began 10 years earlier in the south

• Ripe with racial tensions, poverty, traditional morals and ideals

While Lee was writing TKAM• Era: the heart of the Civil

Rights Movement– 1955 Montgomery bus

boycott– 1954: Segregation deemed

unconstitutional

• Racial tensions were intense: KKK activity, hate crimes, lynching, Jim Crow Laws

Why do we read this book?

• Understand and be aware of certain ideologies that persisted and still exist in society (racism, sexism, classism, etc)

• Because it is a timeless story with lessons about justice, challenges, prejudices, courage (physical and moral), identity, family, and growing up emotionally, intellectually and physically…Which of these don’t relate to you?

• Make discoveries about ourselves and our world, as with most great stories

Presenting your narrator: Scout Finch

• Characterization: we learn about characters by being told about them, by seeing them in action and/or through internal viewings

• Is Scout a boy or girl? Black or white? How do you know?

Scout is our narrator and is between the ages of 6-9 when the story takes place. We see her view of the world when she was this age, but she tells the story in 2 ways: what she believes she saw, heard, felt and thought and her re-evaluation of the events.

Examples of times you witnessed something and only understood it later, looking back.

Questions? Comments? Discussion of reading

Works Cited• http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://bp2.blogger.com/_Mq5qyAsSNIQ/RqYlpjXAGYI/

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