To Kill A Mockingbird

History The book takes place in the mid-1930s What was going on in history at that point? Economy, race relations, etc.

History: Great Depression 13 million Americans lost their jobs Sharecropping White landowner divided land into shares & provided small houses, tools, and seeds for the sharecropper Once crops were harvested, landowners received a percentage of the profits, after taking out expenses they incurred on behalf of the sharecroppers Landowners pushed sharecroppers to use all of their share for farming, which left no land on which to grow their own food Sharecroppers then bought food from the grocery store, thus owing money to the store owner and the landowner During the Depression, it was difficult for sharecroppers to sell their crops-- they could not pay their bills Not much different than slavery…

History: Southern Social Structure Upper class: Plantation owners, professionals (doctors, lawyers, etc.) Finch family Middle class: Owners of small farms and small-town businesses Cunningham family Lower class: African-American farmers, unskilled laborers Tom Robinson, Calpurnia, Ewell family Importance of Heritage Upper class: people whose family had lived in the same area for generations Amount of money they had = not as important as the appearance of comfort In the Depression, since money could not be the differentiating factor, ancestry was used to separate the “elite” from the “common”

History: Racism Segregation/Jim Crow laws Voting Separate restrooms, trains, buses, schools, etc. African-American schools were not given books or supplies Voting 1870: Voting rights for African-American men Many Southern states circumvented this law by having stringent voter registration requirements Literacy tests: several African-Americans were illiterate, and illiterate white men could invoke the “grandfather clause,” which stated any man could vote if he could prove his grandfather did. The grandparents of African-American voters at the time had not been allowed to vote. Poll taxes: most African-Americans did not have the money to pay the poll tax

History: Racism Poverty Lynching Textile mills began to open, but skilled and unskilled jobs were reserved for whites African-Americans received most menial (think minimum wage) jobs, at salaries that kept them below the poverty level. How did that keep them from working their way up in the world? Because of their lack of education, most African-Americans worked in farming and domestic positions The Social Security Act was passed in 1935; provided retirement and unemployment compensation for all American workers, with the exception of those working in farming and domestic positions. Lynching KKK founded by Confederate army veterans to oppose changes that occurred during Reconstruction Exacted their own “justice” – killing

History: Scottsboro Trials Scottsboro Trials– 1931 to 1976 Nine African-American men tried for raping two white women Significant impact on author Harper Lee Served as inspiration for To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird Published in 1960 What was going on at that time? Civil Rights Movement 1954: Brown v. Board of Education 1955: Rosa Parks 1956: Autherine Lucy admitted to U. of Alabama; violence erupted and the Board of Trustees forbade her return, despite the courts’ ruling Hit the bestseller list and stayed there for a year and a half– 15 million copies sold Lee won the Pulitzer Prize in 1961

Harper Lee Many critics say she modeled the narrator and main character, Scout Finch, after herself Lee, according to some sources, was frightened by the book’s success She never wrote another novel and gave her last interview to Roy Newquist in 1964– became quite reclusive Go Set a Watchman, Lee’s first draft, was published in 2015; it is set 20 years after To Kill a Mockingbird Passed away in February 2016 at age 89 Lee was born in Monroeville, Alabama in 1926 Lee’s father was a small-town lawyer Harper Lee’s mother’s maiden name was Frances Finch Scout was born in Alabama in 1926 Scout’s father, Atticus, is a small-town lawyer Scout’s last name is Finch

What is literary theory/criticism? Interpretive tools that help us think more deeply and insightfully about the literature that we read. A “lens.” Each school of criticism has its own approaches to the act of reading. New Historicism (1980s–present): An approach that breaks down distinctions between “literature” and “historical context” by examining the contemporary production and reception of literary texts, including the dominant social, political, and moral movements of the time.  Objective of New Historicism: to understand cultural and intellectual history through literature.