To Kill A Mockingbird

Background PowerPoint and

Notes

Racial SegregationJanuary 1, 1863: Lincoln

issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which declared freedom for all slaves.– Intended to weaken the

South’s power during the U.S. Civil War

– Although slaves were “free,” black people were affected by state laws that prevented equality

– These laws were known as the Jim Crow Laws

Plessy vs. Ferguson

Strengthened the already popular Jim Crow Laws

In 1892, 30-year-old Homer Plessy was jailed for sitting in a “white” section of a railroad car

Plessy was 1/8th black, but under Louisiana law, he was considered “colored” and was supposed to ride in the “colored car.”

Plessy argued that his arrest was a violation of the Constitution

Ferguson, the judge, found Plessy GUILTY of refusing to leave the “white car.” See handout

Plessy vs. Ferguson

After an appeal, the case went to the Supreme Court, which upheld the decision and perpetuated the concept of “separate but equal.”

This enabled schools, courthouses, libraries, hotels, theaters, restaurants, public transportation, etc., to segregate “coloreds” from “whites.”

““Jim Crow” LawsJim Crow” Laws From the 1880s to the

1960s most states enforced segregation through the “Jim Crow” laws named after a black-faced character in minstrel shows.

Through these laws legal punishments could be imposed on people for having contact with members of another race.

Jim Crow Laws

The term Jim Crow comes from the minstrel show song “Jump Jim Crow” written in 1828 and performed by Thomas Dartmouth “Daddy” Rice, a white English migrant to the U.S. and the first popularizer of blackface performance.

A caricature of a shabbily dressed rural black named “Jim Crow” became a standard character in minstrel shows.

Jim Crow GuideJim Crow Guide 1. A Black male could not offer his hand (to shake hands) with a White male because it

implied being socially equal. Obviously, a Black male could not offer his hand or any other part of his body to a White woman, because he risked being accused of rape.

·     2. Blacks and Whites were not supposed to eat together. If they did eat together,

Whites were to be served first, and some sort of partition was to be placed between them. ·   3. Under no circumstance was a Black male to offer to light the cigarette of a White

female -- that gesture implied intimacy.

·    4.  Blacks were not allowed to show public affection toward one another in public, especially kissing, because it offended Whites.

·     5. Blacks were introduced to Whites, never Whites to Blacks. ·    6.  Whites did not use courtesy titles of respect when referring to Blacks, for example,

Mr., Mrs., Miss., Sir, or Ma'am. Instead, Blacks were called by their first names or by “boy” or “girl” (regardless of age). Blacks had to use courtesy titles when referring to Whites, and were not allowed to call them by their first names.

·     7. If a Black person rode in a car driven by a White person, the Black person sat in the back seat, or the back of a truck.

·     8. White motorists had the right-of-way at all intersections.

etiquette

Blacks were expected to refer to whites with titles of superiority like BOSS, SIR, CAPTAIN, MISS, or MRS.

Whites referred to blacks using derogatory terms like BOY, LADY, GIRL and the N word.

Blacks were expected to let whites walk on the sidewalk and signs reading things like “Negroes and Dogs Not Allowed” were common

After the Civil War, The Ku Klux Klan was formed as a secret society that promoted white supremacy using violence and terrorism to undo the gains that former slaves had made.

However, after the 1920s the KKK was no longer secretive about their work and public violence against Blacks, including lynching, became common occurrences.

After WW1After WW1

Even though Blacks had fought bravely for the US in WW1, they returned home from Europe to find the same, if not worse, discrimination and segregation.

The economic struggles of the 1930s seemed only to worsen the situation.

Langston HughesLangston Hughes (1902-1967)(1902-1967)

“Will V-Day Be Me-Day Too?”

…I am a Negro American

Out to defend my land…

I’ve seen my buddy lying

Where he fell.

I’ve watched him dying

I promised him that I would try

To make our land a land

Where his son could be a man –

And there’d be no Jim Crow birds

Left in our sky…

So this is what I want to know:

When we see Victory’s glow,

Will you still let old Jim Crow

hold me back?

…will Dixie Lynch me still

When I return?…

The Scottsboro Trials In 1931, a fight between white and black teen boys occurred on

a train between Tennessee and Alabama. Two girls on a train, one well-known prostitute and one minor,

were accused of violating the Mann Act (crossing state lines for prostitution).

They immediately accused all nine black men of rape.

The Scottsboro TrialsEight of the nine

boys were sentenced to death despite the fact that they were not even all in the same rail car.

Appeals continued for years and only two were acquitted.

See excerpt

The Great Depression (1930s)The Great Depression (1930s)

The Depression hit the South especially hard

Everyone, seemed to be living in poverty

Americans turned away from the rest of the world and away from each other

During these years of turmoil, discontent started to grow in the minds of Whites and Blacks alike.

The Great Depression

Overspending in the 1920’s

Stock Market crash of 1929

President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal

World War II

To kill a MockingbirdTo kill a Mockingbird

It is in this setting that the novel To Kill a Mockingbird takes place.

In a small town, in the deep South, in the early 1930s

 

 

 

Harper LeeHarper Lee (1926-)(1926-)

To add to the complexity of the story, Harper Lee wrote it during a time of even greater social turbulence in the United States.

In the 1950s the winds of change began to blow and Black Americans were no longer willing to be treated as lesser human beings.

Harper LeeBorn Nelle Harper Lee, April

28, 1926Grew up during the Great

DepressionGrew up in Monroeville,

Alabama, in the heart of the South, where racial tension was high

Dad was a lawyerMother’s maiden name was

Finch

Brown vs. Board of EducationBrown vs. Board of Education In 1954, after 2 years in court,

the nation was shocked by a landmark decision to grant Linda Brown, a Black fifth-grader, admission into a white elementary school in Topeka, Kansas.

The decision engendered feelings of triumph and outrage across a country that had lived under the weight of racial segregation and discrimination

for over 100 years.

The Winds of ChangeThe Winds of Change Soon, average

Black citizens across the country began speaking out against oppression and demanding equal rights. This was the beginning of America’s Civil Rights Movement.

Rosa Parks Rosa Parks (1913-)(1913-)

In 1955, after a long day of work, 42-year-old Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man on a Montgomery County bus

This set off peaceful and violent protests throughout the South.

Television Changes EverythingTelevision Changes Everything By this time, many families had

televisions and as images of Southern race riots and violent protests reached into American homes the magnitude of Southern racism began to sink into the American consciousness.

Moreover, the rest of the world

began to frown upon America’s treatment of Blacks, and segregation, like slavery, became a national embarrassment for a country who had fought in two world wars as great liberators of the down-trodden masses.

Dr. Martin Luther King Dr. Martin Luther King (1929-1968)(1929-1968)

Black Hero-Leaders began to rally together Black Americans in order to fight oppression and for a country where all men were truly treated as equals.

DesegregationDesegregation A national and international call

for desegregation of the South rang out and Blacks and Whites all over the country started putting pressure on governments to amend the segregation laws.

Those individuals, both Black and White, who fought for Civil Rights were under constant attack from White Supremacists who were unwilling to accept Black Americans as equals

Many freedom-fighters died for their efforts

To Kill a MockingbirdTo Kill a Mockingbird In the Fall of 1960, in the

middle of the Civil Rights Movement, To Kill a Mockingbird was published.

It shot to the top of the New York Times best seller list.

A country was finally ready to listen to the story of segregation and open their minds to the possibility of an America where Whites and Blacks could live together as equals.

“ I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."

Dr. Martin Luther King

History of the Novel

Harper Lee’s novel is one of the best-selling books in the nation’s history.

Won the Pulitzer PrizeTranslated into more than 40 languagesBeen made into an enormously popular

movieLibrarians across the country voted it the

best novel of the 20th century.

History of the Novel cont.

Frequently cited by readers as the book that has made the biggest difference in their lives.

**Through the lives of children, it allows the reader to walk around in the shoes of people who are different from ourselves.**The novel challenges our stereotypes—of the Southerner, of the African American, the eccentric, the child, and the young lady.

Setting/ Basic Info

Maycomb Country, Alabama (fictional)

1933-1935 Written: Mid-50s Narrator: Scout Finch

– 1st person narrator– Use flashback– Tone—childlike, humorous,

innocent; as the novel progresses, dark, foreboding, and critic of society

– She bases Scout somewhat on herself

Scout has matured over the years and humorously comments on the innocence she displayed in her thoughts / actions as a young girl

She mostly tells of her thoughts but focuses on her brother Jem’s thoughts also

Jem Finch

Scout’s older brotherHe undergoes a transformation from

innocent child to a young adult who is faced with the realities of living in his small town and what prejudices exist right outside his front porch.

Atticus Finch

Father and only parent to Scout and Jem Finch

Local lawyer like Lee’s biological fatherHe is the lawyer who is defending a black

man accused of raping a teenage girl in the 1930s during the midst of the Great Depression.

Major Thematic Ideas Remember a theme is usually in sentence form.

These are the thematic ideas.– Prejudice—the most obvious – Equal justice– Courage: moral, physical, and mental– Social ostracism (exclusion)– Maturation– Heroism– Friendship– Innocence and what can happen to it

Literary Terms FocusAllusion—reference within a literary work

to another fiction work, a film, a piece of art, or a real event.– Positives: A way of drawing on this outside

work / object to provide greater context / meaning to the situation being discussed

– Negatives: People may not always understand or know the work or object being referenced

Example– His love for her drove him to stamp out her life like

Othello did to Desdemona.

Literary Terms Focus

Symbol: people, places, or things used to represent something else in literature– Personal: certain objects mean certain things to

us– Cultural: “Hang on Sloopy” = OSU– Universal:

Literary Terms Focus

Idiom: Meaning cannot be deduced from literal definitions or arrangement of words– Figurative meaning must be used instead

Examples:– Sitting around waiting is making me antsy.

– Life has been difficult for you recently, but keep your chin up. Everything will be better soon.”

– He says nice things to me when we’re together, but he makes jokes about me when we aren’t. He’s two-faced.”

– “That really gets my goat.” (From TKAM)

Connection to Life Mini-Writing Assignment—1-2 paragraphs due by

Thursday 01/08– Think about your early childhood or now

Were there any houses on your street you were afraid of? Were there any legends or scary stories you were told about

someone on your street, family member, teacher, etc. that you believed?

Was there anyone you lived near but never saw? Was there anyone at school you heard “stories” about that

were not true but you believed and feared?

– Think for a few minutes about this mysterious or scary person or experience and write it down. Explain the outcome as well. COME UP WITH SOMETHING!! Make it creative—like a short narrative

– ***Must be typed or handwritten in MLA with 4 line heading, header with last name and page number, title, double spaced, etc. ***

The EndThe End