Chapter 4 Writing a Research Report

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

A. Influences on LiteratureHarper Lee published To Kill a Mockingbird in 1960. The events in the book are set in the 1930s. Conduct research and then write a report that answers this question: How did the historical and cultural setting of the mid-1900s influence the events in To Kill a Mockingbird? Use information from at least four sources in your report and use a standard format for citations.

Chapter 4 Writing a Research Report

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

Final Essay: To Kill a Mockingbird’s Historical Roots

To Kill a Mockingbird, published by Harper Lee in 1960, is one of most beloved American novels. It is the story of Scout and her brother Jem who live in a small town in Alabama in the 1930s. The plot centers on events that happen one summer when their father, who is a lawyer, defends an African American man accused of raping a white woman. Clearly, the small southern town setting is very important to the plot. However, the time period when Lee was writing the book must have also impacted her perspective on

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

the events in the story. When writing To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee was influenced both by growing up in the segregated South of the 1930s and by experiencing the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s. The South in the 1930s Harper Lee grew up in a small town in Alabama called Monroeville. Like Scout, her father was a lawyer (Marotous). In a rare interview from the 1960s, Lee said, “From childhood on, I did sit in the courtroom watching my father argue cases and talk to juries” (“Harper Lee/To Kill a Mockingbird Exhibit”).

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

The book is set in the period from 1933 to 1935. During this time, the South was segregated along color lines. Whites and blacks were not allowed to go to the same schools, eat in the same restaurants, or even use the same drinking fountains (Rachel68ism). In 1962 Lee said, “. . . there is not an incident in [the book] that is factual. The trial, and the rape charge that brings on the trial, are made up out of a composite of such cases and charges” (“Harper Lee/To Kill a Mockingbird Exhibit”). However, a historical incident that has many parallels to Tom Robinson’s trial is the Scottsboro Trials of the 1930s. In the Scottsboro Trials,

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

nine black men were accused of raping two poor white women. The all-white jury chose to convict several of the men almost solely based upon the testimony of one of the women, a known prostitute. The judge in the case, James E. Horton, went against public opinion and tried to protect the rights of the accused black men (Durst Johnson). In the book, Atticus defends a black man even when the townspeople don’t want him to.

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

The United States in the 1950s During the 1950s when Harper Lee was writing the book, the civil rights era was just beginning. Both positive and negative things were happening. On the positive side, in 1954 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas overturned the “separate but equal” public schools policy making segregation of public school illegal (Durst Johnson). In 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man on a bus, beginning the Montgomery bus boycott, led by Martin Luther King. Negatively, in Mississippi a young African American boy named Emmett Till was beaten,

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

shot, and lynched by white men for whistling at a white woman(Durst Johnson). Published in 1960, Lee’s book came into being when justice for African Americans was sweeping the country. Lee’s choice to tell her story through the eyes of an innocent young girl was brilliant. Seeing their hatred through the eyes of a child, pierced the conscience of Americans in a way that no speech or protest ever could.

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Activity 6A Writing a Research Report (p. 69)

Lee was influenced both by the segregated South of her youth and the civil rights movement of her adult years. To continues to shine the light of acceptance in dark places where people are judged by their color, race, sexual orientation, or religion, rather than by their value as human beings. As Scout says at the end of the book, “I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks” (Lee).