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Example research essay topic: Scout And Jem Kill A Mockingbird - 2,658 words

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To Kill A Mockingbird To Kill A Mockingbird is a story about racism, ignorance, fear, intolerance, hate, injustice, learning, heroism, and growing up. It is set in Maycomb County, an imaginary district in Southern Alabama. The time is the early 1930 s, the years of the Great Depression when poverty and unemployment were widespread in the United States. The Finch family contains of Atticus (The head of the household), Aunt Alexandra (Atticus sister), and (Jem) Jeremy (The older of Atticus two children), Scout (The younger of the two. She also try s to be a boy by doing boy things), and you cant forget their black maid Calpurnia. Miss Rachael is Dills aunt that lives in Maycomb.

Dill is friends with Jem and Scout. According to Scout they are married. (Boo) Arthur Radley is the man that takes Jem back to his house after Jem Bob Ewell hurts Jem. Tom Robinson is a black man that was accused of raping Mayella Ewell. Bob Ewell is Mayella's father.

He is out for revenge on Atticus for what he did to him and his daughter. Mayella is Bobs daughter who supposedly got raped by Tom Robinson. Judge Taylor is the Judge of Maycomb County. Heck Tate is the county law official.

Atticus tells his children: I prefer you shoot tin cans, but I know youll wanna shoot birds, if you can hit em. Shoot all the Blue Jays you want, but never shoot a Mockingbird. All they do for us is sing their hearts out for us. Remember its a sin to kill a Mockingbird. The Mockingbirds in this story are Boo Radley and Tom Robinson.

Mr. Radley is a mystery man and scary. Tom Robinson is Black and wrongly accused of crime. To Kill A Mockingbird is told through Scout. Scout is much like a boy, 8 years old, and funny. Scout hated to be called a girl and she wore britches.

She knew how to read before she started her school, where most of the first grade had failed last year. She was good at fighting with boys. She loved her father Atticus and brother Jem. Not so much Calpurnia, who always orders her around. She is ready to beat up people to get them into their senses. Jem is near his teens.

His mother died when he was young, so he misses her and tells his younger sister about her. His only friend is Scout until they meet Dill. He is very brave and moody. They read novels and play in the tree house. Scout and Jem found our father satisfactory: he played with us, read with us, and treated us with courteous detachment.

They called their father Atticus. Atticus is an old man in his 50 s, and nice. He never went to school, but studied to be an attorney. He wore glasses and was nearly blind in his left eye.

He did not hunt, drink, fish, or play poker. He was very intelligent and tries to teach Scout and Jem how to behave and understand other people. Atticus Finch is related to nearly every family in Maycomb by blood or marriage. Scout thought that he did not do anything that could possibly arouse the admiration of anyone He sat in the living room and read.

Boo Radley is a mysterious man so hes only know for what other people say about him. Scout tells Dill in the house lived a malevolent phantom. She and Jem had never seen Boo Radley. When peoples azaleas froze in a cold snap, it was because he had breathed on them. People said that he committed many crimes. Black people would not pass his house at night and Boo Radley's pecans would kill a man.

A baseball hit into Radley was a lost ball, because children were afraid to collect it. Jem described Boo Radley being: six-and-a-half feet tall. He dined on raw squirrels and cats. He had a scar on hiss face. His teeth were yellow and rotten, and eyes popped out. And he drooled most of the time.

Jem also figured that Mr. Radley kept Boo chained to the bed most of the time, or he was dead and stuck into the chimney. The truth is that Jem had never seen Boo Radley, but receives a lot of gifts from him not knowing that Boo Radley gave them. They ran past his house. Tom Robinson is a poor, black man who has a wife and three children, just trying to make money for his family, although people dont have much use of him since he can only us his right hand. His left arm was caught in a cotton gin.

It tore all his muscles apart. He had received 30 days sentence for disorderly conduct, when another man tried to cut him and he fought back. He is 25 years old. This story starts off with Scout telling about their family history, and how Scout and Jem meet Dill. Charles Baker Harris is six years old and he can read. He has good imagination and played well the ape of Tarzan.

He has snow-white hair, blue eyes and is short. He gave the children the idea of making Boo Radley come out. They share stories and myths they heard about Boo Radley. He never comes out of the house, so they have never seen him or really know what he is like. After the first summer Scout starts her school. The new teacher does not like that Scout knows how to read and write, and tells her to tell her father not to teach her anymore.

Atticus teaches Scout a simple trick how to get better along with all kinds of folks. He says you never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view until you climb into his skin and walk around in it. What Atticus Finch means is that people should not label others before really knowing them. Scout has a lot of labels. She says that: They were Havenfords, in Maycomb County a synonymous with jackass.

When Walter Cunningham does not accept the quarter the teacher offers, Scout tells the teacher: he is s a Cunningham, meaning Cunningham s never take anything they cannot pay back. One of the students say: He is one of the Ewell's, maam, meaning that Ewell's are dirty and attend school only for the first day. Their neighbor, Mrs. Dubose, was the meanest old woman who ever lived.

Scout tells there is a caste system in Maycomb, a simple guide to daily life: never take a check from a Delafield, all Buford s walk like that, and every third Merri weather is morbid. The next summer Scout, Jem and Dill continued their plays. They played Tarzan, Radley game and told stories. Most of the stories were about Boo Radley. One night they planned to go and peep in the window of the Radley place. They sneaked into the back yard.

Jem crawled to the window and looked in. At that moment they saw a shadow of a man moving towards Jem. They ran. A roar of a shotgun shattered the neighborhood. Jems pants got stuck on the fence and he kicked his pants off to get loose, and run home. Later he returned to get his pants, and found them folded across the fence and sewed up.

The next winter miss Maudies house burned down, and Scout is astonished to learn that it was Boo Radley who put a blanket around her. Scout gets angry with Cecil Jacobs, who tells everybody in the schoolyard that her father defended niggers. She asks her father what Cecil means, and Atticus told her it was his job. He tells Scout that Tom Robinson, the Negro and friend of Calpurnia's, is a good man. When Scout asks if they are going to win the case, Atticus tells her no. Even her cousins call Atticus a nigger-lover, just because he is going to defend a black man.

This is the start of rising action. While the children are playing in the front yard they see Tim Johnson (Mr. Johnsons dog), but the dog is acting a little weird, so they call their housekeeper Calpurnia. She sees the dog and immediately knows the dog is a rapid dog.

She calls Atticus and all the other people near town. When Atticus arrives to the scene, he is asked to shoot the dog by Heck Tate, who is the sheriff of Maycomb County. Atticus hesitates for a short time, then aims and shoots and kills the rapid dog. This act surprised Jem and Scout, because they thought Atticus was too old to do anything. One day Calpurnia takes Scout and Jem to her church, where Negroes worshipped on Sundays and white men gambled on weekdays. Calpurnia was all bones and angles.

She was one of the most educated blacks. She is like a mother to Jem and Scout. There the children learn that also Blacks can be racist. When they enter the church, miss Lula stops her and asks: Why you bringin white chill to nigger church? She does not want Scout and Jem into their church, but others invite them to sty. They learn that Blacks do not know how to read, and that is why they do not have hymnbooks.

Only four of the Blacks can read and write, and Calpurnia is one of them. She is the one who has taught Scout to write so well. Reverend Sykes collects money for the Robinson family. When Tom Robinson is moved to Maycomb jail, Atticus goes to guard the jail. The children sneaked out to see what is going on. When they arrive, they find a mob of men trying to get in and hurt Tom Robinson.

Atticus is between them and Tom Robinson. The children run to Atticus. For the first time in his life Jem does not obey Atticus order and will not leave him alone with the mob. Scout notices Mr. Cunningham in the mob and greets him, and tells that Walter was in her grade. We brought him home for a dinner one time.

Maybe he told you about me. I beat him up one time but he was real nice about it. Tell him hey for me. This changed Mr.

Cunningham's mind and he told the others to go home. The big day has come. The climax of this whole story: Tom Robinsons trial. Tom was accused of raping a white woman, Mayella Ewell.

The children sneaked into the courthouse to watch the trial. Because it was so full, they went upstairs with reverend Sykes and other Blacks. Heck Tate was first to take the stand. He says that Mayella, the white woman, was beaten mostly on the right side of her face and strangled. Mayella's father, Mr.

Ewell, was next. Atticus had told Scout the Ewell s had been the disgrace of Maycomb for three generations. Ewell s live behind the town garbage dump, in an old Negro cabin. Atticus asked Robert E. Lee Ewell to write his name, and he did.

Turns out that Mr. Ewell is left-handed. Mayella is next to take the stand. Scout found her lonely, white people wouldnt have anything to do with her, because she lived among pigs; Negroes wouldnt have anything to do with her, because she was white. Atticus questioned her.

Everyone could see that her story was false, and at the end she screams: That nigger yonder took advantage of me an if you fine, fancy gentlemen dont wanna do nothin about it then youre all yellow stinkin cowards, the lot of you. Tom Robinson testifies that she asked him to fix the door. When he comes inside, and when he is about to leave, because the door needs no fixing, she jumps on him and kisses him. That is when Mr.

Ewell came to the window and screamed at her, which scared Tom Robinson who runs away. It turns out that Tom Robinson has helped Ms. Ewell many times. Atticus shows that Tom Robinson could not strangle anyone because his left arm is useless. When the solicitor asked question, Tom Robinson told him that he felt sorry for Ms. Ewell.

Atticus told the jury that the case is as simple as Black and White. He says that the state has not produced any evidence. It has relied upon the testimony of two witnesses who are lairs. Atticus says that Mr. Ewell is the guilty one. She lied because she could not tell the truth; she tempted a Negro.

After the break the verdict is read: Guilty Guilty Guilty, and so Tom Robinson is taken to jail. Later Atticus tries to explain to Jem why Tom Robinson was found guilty. As you grow older, youll see white men cheat black me every day of your life, but let me tell you something and dont you forget it whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich he is, or how fine a family he comes from, that white man is trash. Jem learns that women cannot serve as jurors in Alabama. The falling action starts when Atticus returns home, he tells them that Tom Robinson was shot while trying to escape. The sad thing about this was that everyone knew Tom was innocent.

In the Maycomb Tribune on the following Thursday Mr. B. B. Underwood likened Toms death to: senseless slaughter of songbirds by hunters and children. After a classroom discussion of Adolf Hitler, Jem asks Atticus. But is it okay to hate Hitler?

Atticus answers: It is not. It is not okay to hate anybody. The next night Scout and Jem prepare for a Halloween night presentation at their school. When returning they are attacked by Mr. Ewell. Luckily there was a stranger to save them.

Jem was badly hurt and was carried home. Turns out that the stranger was Boo Radley, and he killed Bob Ewell, but Heck Tate tells Atticus he intends to report that Mr. Ewell fell on his knife. He says: Mr. Finch, there are some kind of people you have to shoot before you say his to em.

Even then, they aint worth the bullet it takes to shoot em. Mr. Ewell was one of them. I feel in this story that Atticus is the hero. He stood up for Tom Robinson even thought most people called him a nigger-lover. He stood up for justice, and protected Tom before the trial, when a group of men tried to lynch him.

Scout and Jem learned an important lesson from many people Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose and Mr. Dolphus Raymond. In the end of the book Scout says: Atticus was right. One time he said that you never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them. This is the teaching of the book.

It is easy to see that the mockingbird in this story is Tom Robinson a harmless man who becomes a victim of racial prejudice. Like the mockingbird, Tom has never done wrong to anyone. Even the jurors who sentence him to death have nothing personal against him. They find him guilty mostly because they feel that to take the word of a black man over two whites would threaten the system they live under, the system of segregation. Tom himself is guilty of nothing but being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

There is no doubt in my mind that Harper Lee s To Kill a Mockingbird is a moving story of racial injustice in the South as well as a touching coming-of-age story. I believe the courtroom scene demonstrates the depth of the racial discrimination in the area, stirring the consciences of all readers. Only the most simple-minded of readers can fail to be affected by the adventures of Scout and Jem.


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Research essay sample on Scout And Jem Kill A Mockingbird

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