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To kill a mockingbird gender analysis
To kill a mockingbird gender analysis
How women are oppressed by female writers in literature
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It’s 2016 and women still face oppressive gender standards from society. Although Harper Lee’s story, To Kill a Mockingbird, is set in the 1930’s, the novel touches on topics relevant in today’s society, such as women’s oppression. The narrator, Scout Finch, is a spunky tomboy who grew up in a small town in Alabama. Scout’s mother died when Scout was young, so Scout was raised primarily her father, Atticus, and her aunt, Alexandra. This left Scout with sparse feminine influence when Scout was young, aside from Aunt Alexandra. Lee uses Aunt Alexandra’s character, Scout’s tomboy-ish life style, and the idea of being a proper lady to reflect the social pressures women face to fulfill society’s standards. Lee uses Aunt Alexandra’s harsh notions of proper feminity in order to mirror the negative messages given to girls by society. Alexandra repeatedly insists that Scout behaves like a proper lady, regarding Scout's clothing choices and Scout's role at home. Scout stated …show more content…
For example, one of Scout’s elderly neighbors shouts at Scout one day and says “What are you doing in those overalls? You should be in a dress and camisole, young lady!” (Lee 85) which demonstrates how the pressure to be a lady is forced onto girls regardless of how young the girl is. This statement and numerous others leave Scout with the unwanted burden of attempting to be a proper lady. This internal conflict within Scout is shown when she replies that she wants to be “just a lady,” (Lee 196) after being asked about what Scout wants to be when she’s older. Through this, the idea of being a proper lady is shown to place a heavy and unwanted concern on young girls. Therefore, the toxic obligation put on young girls to be a proper young lady is narrowing the choices girls make, extending as far as making being a lady the only goal girls hope to accomplish in
Scout Finch, the main character of the book, is a nine-year-old girl who is the narrator of the story. Scout’s Aunt Alexandra stereotypes Scout in the book many times. She says that Scout was born un-ladylike and that she could never be a lady because of the way she dresses. This point is proven when Scout says, "I suggested that one could be a ray of sunshine in pants just as well, but Aunty said […] that I was born good but had grown progressively worse every year" (Lee 81). Also, Scout’s br...
Even though many social forces impact Scout in Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, gender impacts Scout the greatest. It affects her in how other people treat her. Unexpectedly, Aunt Alexandra shows up at the Finch household, and Scout asks why she had just shown up. Aunt Alexandra replies, “We decided that it would be good for you to have some feminine influence. It won’t be many years, Jean Louise, before you become interested in clothes and boys” (127). After Alexandra says this, Scout becomes puzzled because she does not think she needs a “feminine influence”. But, as she becomes older she is expected to act more lady like. Since she is a girl, she is expected to act prim and proper. Her being raised around men is acting against these stereotypes. Certainly, it is obvious that boys are more daring than girls. So while Jem and Dill want to get a sneak peak inside of Boo Radley’s house, Scout gets a little apprehensive. Jem shouts out, “Scout I’m telling you for the last time shut your trap or go home. I declare to the lord you’re getting more like a girl every day,” (51-52). After Jem said this, she decides she has no option but to join them. She does...
Scout is a young girl growing up in the south, she is intelligent, thoughtful, and good natured. Her identity is somewhat uncommon during the time she lives in. She is characterized as a tomboy, who doesn’t always act “lady like” or proper by southern standards. Scout most likely became the type of person she is by the care of her father, Atticus. He shapes her mind, while trying to protect her from a dangerous world and preserving her childhood.
Aunt Alexandra recognizes Scout’s maturity when she invites Scout to a seemingly meaningless lady’s brunch. As Scout views the gathering,she understands that this is no ordinary brunch but it is a showcase of social talent. Scout remembers, “There was no part about it, I must soon enter this world” (Lee 267). In this quote Scout comes to the realization that being a lady is not only justified in actions but also in universally accepted social functions. It is here that Scout’s lessons in womanhood come full circle and she is able to embrace a part of her existence that she had brushed off for a long time. Mayella Ewell is a singular character that gives an important insight into understanding of lower classes but in a less literal sense she is an extension of Scout. Mayella is part of Scout that is arrogant,confused, and denies the truth of the adult world. As Aunt Alexandra constantly mentions, she will never befriend the Cunninghams “Don’t be silly, Jean Louise,”said Aunt Alexandra. “The thing is, you can scrub Walter Cunningham till he shines,you can put him in shoes and a new suit, but he’ll never be like Jem” (Lee 256). While in relation to Scout, Aunt Alexandra is portrayed as uptight, she is the ideal lady of
Scout’s Aunt Alexandra helped develop Scout from tomboy to lady. For the most part confound Scout as she desires and wants to be a tomboy and wants to be free of Aunt Alexandra would like her to be more conservative and be bound by the traditions of the southern culture which she feels is incredibly important. The one moment where Scout really appears to be influenced by Aunt Alexandra is when Scout notices with some small amount of pride that in the midst of all the furor over the trial and other events in the town, Aunt Alexandra maintains her composure and her "lady-like" demeanor which Scout admires and feels she can learn from. Also Scout learns many negative aspects from Aunt Alexandra during
Prior to the feminist movement of the 1960s, women had to follow strict gender roles. Scout is a prime example of a female child struggling to fit these roles placed upon her by not only males in society, but women too. The moment Aunt Alexandra enters Maycomb, she places it upon herself to mould young Scout and Jem into their societal roles. Scout especially suffers a great deal of criticism and pressure from her Aunt to be the stereotypical girl;
...she describes the pompous women. The author uses the women's conversations to emphasize the reasons Scout remains a tomboy and refuses the traits of Maycomb females.
As a growing young girl, Scout was learning and experiencing things just like any other child would though growing up. She got older and was able to understand things a lot better as well as being able to apply lessons she had learned in her everyday life. She began to act slightly more grown up in situations such as Aunt Alexandria's dinner party. Scout forgot how much she despised her Aunt and how much she disliked dresses and joined the group of women in their conversations. Despite how she didn't want to "act more like a lady", she played along with her Aunt's "campaign to teach me (Scout) to be a lady" made an exception to please her Aunt and to create some peace between them. Upon hearing the news of Tom's death she concludes "if Aunty could be a lady at a time like this, so could I." This shows how Scout was beginning to act more ladylike for her Aunt.
Scout wears overalls and wants to play with and help her brother and her guy best friend. She despises dresses and wants to fit in with the guys. Alexandra shames her for this because she, “needs to act more like a lady,” which Scout could care less about at the age of nine. There is also a speech called “Ain’t I a Woman?” which is about a woman that is trying to stand up for her rights.
(Lee 108) Scout is a full-on tomboy and she's never seen herself as a girl. But, Aunt Alexandra wants to teach Scout how to be a lady is genuinely embarrassed by the way Scout dresses and acts. She thinks the reason Scout acts the way she does is because of the influence of
Sexism is not as common a topic in comparison to racism, but does play a role in the development of the novel. This type of discrimination is expressed towards women from men and women alike. Men feel compelled to protect women from unsightly things, (Lee 221), and the women in Maycomb have the mind set that, to be a lady, they must conform to society's expectations of them. They believe they must dress, act, and speak a certain way to appease the community. Aunt Alexandra is a big believer in acting the way society expects her to and attempts to impose these values on her niece, Scout, who becomes mortified, as she has always been a tomboy and prefers spending time in the dirt. “Aunt Alexandra was fanatical on the subject of my [Scout's] attire. She said I could not possibly hope to be a lady if I wore breeches; when I said I could do nothing in a dress, she said I wasn't supposed ...
In the story, Scout describes how Aunt Alexandra exhibits dominance over Scout’s wardrobe, and even berating her for wearing clothes that Alexandra sees fit. In the novel, Lee writes: “Aunt Alexandra was fanatical on the subject of my attire. I could not possibly hope to be a lady if I wore breeches; when I said I could do nothing in a dress, she said I wasn’t supposed to be doing things that required pants. Aunt Alexandra’s vision of my deportment involved playing with small stoves, tea sets, and wearing the Add-A-Pearl necklace she gave me when I was born; furthermore, I should be a ray of sunshine in my father’s lonely life.” (Lee, 81). This piece of evidence shows how Scout feels she should be able to wear whatever she sees fit, but Aunt Alexandra insists that she is not a proper lady if she doesn’t act and wear whatever defines the characteristics of a “lady” in her perception, serving as an insult to her, which implies that she doesn’t act as her gender stereotypically should. This piece of evidence is only one of the plentiful examples of prejudice and discrimination in To Kill A
In Confessions of a Sociopath: A Life Spent Hiding in Plain Sight, M.E. Thomas said, “When you grow up as a girl, it is like there are faint chalk lines traced approximately three inches around your entire body at all times, drawn by society and often religion and family and particularly other women, who somehow feel invested in how you behave, as if your actions reflect directly on all womanhood.” The feeling described in the quote if a perfect representation of how most women felt in the 1930s. Some women living in the 1930s felt pressured to act ladylike, however, over time the expectations and roles of women improved. In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, roles and treatment of the female characters, who were women in the 1930s
How is the relationship between men and women portrayed? Men are shown as wanting women and needing to win the women over for marriage. FOr example, Emily is seen as stuck up since, “None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily” (Faulkner 2).
Later, when Aunt Alexandra came to live with them for a while, some of the first things she said were, “We decided that it would be best for you to have some feminine influence. It won’t be many years before, Jean Louise, before you become interested in clothes and boys--”(Lee 170). We can all see now that both sexes, male and female, at all ages know the basic ways of how women are ‘suppose’ to act, even though they might not want to. Scout, and other young girls, most likely, don’t want to grow up; young people deserve to have fun while they still have their young minds and bodies. The problem for how women are expected to act, and how they are