“Social life is mutual negotiation and society, social order relies on mutual negotiation between individuals; this represents both creed and particular reality in American society.” – Richard Friedrich Munch. Someone’s social life can be imperative in deciding how they live their life. This is also true in Harper Lee’s To Kill A mockingbird, a book focused on Jem and Scout Finch, two young children trying to survive through childhood in Maycomb, a 1930’s town that can be everything but sensitive to others. Such as: a young man who was harassed by the neighborhood children, the local Cunningham family who were looked down upon by almost the entire town, and Tom Robinson, a young black man who is convicted of a crime he didn’t commit. Harper Lee shows that there are two types of outsiders; one type got there by choice because for some reason they don’t agree with society and how things work, while others were pushed away and placed in that position.
Dolphus Raymond chooses to be outside of the norm. He’s an old white man who married into a black family and doesn’t care what any one has to say about it, he shows this many times in the novel. In this quote Raymond is talking to Scout and Dill, a friend of the Finch children, in the yard outside the courtroom the afternoon of the trial: ‘“Secretly, Miss. Finch, I’m not much of a drinker, but you see they could never, never understand that I live like I do because that’s the way I want to live.”'(pg.200) Mr. Raymond tries to explain to the children that he’s not really an alcoholic. He just wants everyone to think that he is so they can have some excuse as to why he lives his life the way he does. But he really lives like that because he doesn’t want to be part of the town. He only wants to be with the people he loves and relates to, the black people of Maycomb. Dolphus Raymond is an outsider by choice.
The Term Paper on Social Contract Man State Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) Perhaps one of the single most important Enlightenment writers was the philosopher-novelist-composer-music theorist-language theorist Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778), not merely for his ideas (which generally recycled older Enlightenment idea) but for his passionate rhetoric which inflamed a generation. The central problem he stared down most of his life he sums ...
Boo Radley wants to be alone. He’s a young man who has basically become a legend through children’s’ imaginations and the stories they’ve come up with. This is how he’s lived his entire life. One night Jem and Scout discuss this and why he’s never come out of his house: ‘“I think I’m beginning to understand why Boo Radley’s stayed shut up in the house all this time… it’s because he wants to stay inside.”'(pg.227) Jem has finally come up with a reasonable conclusion as to why Boo doesn’t live like the rest of them. He wants to- he wants to live his life as an outsider. Boo Radley likes to be alone. He’s not an outsider because people don’t want him; he’s like that because of his own decision. That’s the life Boo Radley chose to live.
The Raymond children are pushed out of society because they are different. Jem explains this to Scout and Dill one day in town: ‘“They don’t belong anywhere. Colored folks won’t have ‘em because they’re half white; white folks won’t have ‘em cause they’re colored, so they’re just in-betweens, don’t belong anywhere.”'(pg.161) In this quote Jem explains to Scout and Dill of the Raymond children’ situation and why throughout their lives they have been pushed out by the town. They were born that way. Split between two groups. Something not received during that time period. That’s why the children are pushed to become outsiders.
The Essay on Gang Life
Gang Life In life, teenagers and adults join gangs for difficulties in their life. They feel that they need a group of people to understand and support them through the rough stage of their life. In the novel, The Outsiders, by S. E. Hinton Ponyboy is a fourteen-year-old boy who is a part of the gang called the greasers. His whole remaining family are greasers.Gang life can lead to death and ...
Mayella has been shunned by society because she’s not like everyone else. This is shown many times throughout the novel. During the trial Atticus Finch, the defendant’s attorney, asks Mayella about her life: ‘“ … a nineteen-year-old girl like you must have friends. Who are your friends?’ The witness frowned as if puzzled. ‘Friends?’”(pg.183) Atticus Finch proves that Mayella is an outsider. She has no friends and lives her life alone. But this was not her choice. People have shunned her away because she’s not like everyone else. Mayella is different. She lives in a squalid house with no mother, several siblings, and an abusive father. And these qualities not being accepted by the “proper” people of Maycomb. This reflection from the town causes them to push her away and she is forced to be an outsider.
Harper Lee shows that outsiders are either there by choice or by force. Either way they are unaccepted by others in the Maycomb community. Rejects of their lives. They can be anything from young girls to old men. No matter what they’re not welcomed by the community and as Munch would say, left as social outcasts.
