Connections between To Kill A Mockingbird, and Non-Fiction Texts

Two Nonfiction Texts :

How Can the Poor Be Helped? 

Is Poverty a Serious Threat?

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Connections between the two texts:

TKAM Chapter 2- Walter doesn’t bring a lunch to school

Chapters 9 & 10 Is Poverty a Serious Threat?- The poor often lack an adequate amount of food.

The Cunninghams (a good example of poverty in Maycomb), don’t have food to send in their lunches, and they don’t have money to buy a lunch, or repay anyone that would buy them a lunch.

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TKAM Chapter 3- Burris Ewell comes to school filthy because he has no way of getting clean at home

Chapters 9 & 10 Is Poverty a Serious Threat?- More than 600 million people in the United States live in neighborhoods or in homeless shelters that are harmful to their health due to lack of sanitation

Because of the Ewell’s conditions, they cannot get clean.

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TKAM Chapter 17- the Ewell’s have a poor quality home, description in the chapter

Chapters 9 & 10 Is Poverty a Serious Threat?- More than 600 million people in the United States live in neighborhoods or in homeless shelters that are harmful to their health due to lack of sanitation

The Ewells live by a dump at the side of town. Their house is made of plank walls, corrugated iron, the roof is made of flattened tin cans, set on four uneven pieces of limestone.

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TKAM Chapter 2- Burris Ewell needs to go to school more than one day a year to be set up for a productive life

Chapters 1-3 How Can the Poor Be Helped?- to help the poor be successful, we need to help the poor develop the skills they will need

If Burris Ewell is going to succeed in life and break the Ewell’s tradition of laziness and poverty, he will need to go to school so that he can set himself up to get a job and live a successful life. He needs initiative to start going, but with a father like Bob, it will be hard.

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TKAM Chapter 2-3- when it says in the book that the government tried to get the Ewells to go to school more often, they should’ve pushed for them to go more, so that the children would get the skills they need to get their family out of poverty

Chapters 1-3 How Can the Poor Be Helped?- “The best way to end poverty is to make sure that no one is unable to work and many people possess the high-quality skills to become effective members of society”

Should the government should push for all kids to go to school and learn the skills they need?

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General TKAM Knowledge :)-  the Ewells only go to school one day per year

Chapters 11 & 12 Is Poverty a Serious Threat?- the Ewells need to go to school more than one day per year so that their family doesn’t have to be the way it is for more generations

If the Ewells want to get themselves out of poverty, they need to go to school to enable themselves to

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General TKAM Knowledge :)- Bob Ewell drinks their welfare checks away

Chapters 5 & 6 Is Poverty a Serious Threat?- ½ of the poor have a history of alcohol abuse

Bob Ewell may abuse alcohol?

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General TKAM Knowledge :)- Bob Ewell has a lot of issues (beating Mayella, trying to kill Jem and Scout, inability to hold a job)

Chapters 5 & 6 Is Poverty a Serious Threat?- those who aren’t well off are 2.5x more likely to have a  mental disorder

Does Bob Ewell have a mental disorder?

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TKAM Chapter 2- Walter Cunningham tells everyone that he has hookworms

Walter doesn’t wear shoes, which explains why he has them. Hookworms are spread by going barefoot it barnyards. This shows how poor the Cunninghams must be if they cannot afford shoes.

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TKAM Chapter 2- Poor people repay by entailment

The Cunninghams have to pay people back with material things instead of money. For example, they paid the Finch’s in stovewood, hickory nuts, turnip greens, and holly at Christmas-time.

Because the Cunninghams had no money to pay the Finch’s, they had to pay the Finch’s with what they have.

Dr. Reynolds sometimes charged people a bushel of potatoes for the delivery of a baby.

 

 

Bob Ewell’s Character Motivation

Bob Ewell’s Main Motivation

Bob Ewell is motivated by his great desire to change his reputation and to make himself look good in the community. Bob wants to change his reputation from being a drunk, irresponsible parent, to being a good, hardworking hero that saved his daughter from a black man.

How does it differ from other’s perspectives on this topic?

For example, in the book, Miss Caroline viewed Burris Ewell, Bob Ewell’s son, as a dirty child that needed to bathe and work harder. Atticus views the Ewells, including Burris, as people in an unfortunate situation that need help changing their misconceptions about black people, as well as getting their life on track to be successful.

Bob Ewell’s Main Character Trait

Bob Ewell shows his irresponsibility throughout To Kill a Mockingbird. 

As a father, Bob Ewell is irresponsible and immature. A few things in the book that I noticed showed his irresponsibility were:

• His inability to hold a job: when he gets a job at the WPA, he is so lazy that he gets fired from it. Scout says,      “(he) probably made himself unique in the annals of the nineteen-thirties: he was the only man I had ever heard of that was fired from the WPA for laziness.” It says in the book, that the Ewell family had been in poverty for three generations. While getting a job was a start for the Ewells, if Bob wanted to get his family out of poverty, he should’ve worked harder at keeping the job, knowing that that was one of his only shots at a different lifestyle.
• The welfare checks that the Ewell’s receive to help pay for family expenses, Bob uses to go out and buy alcohol for himself, and then he goes to the woods to drink for days on end. He should’ve been using the money that he was getting from the government to help buy things for his family, like food.
• When he’s in the woods drinking up his welfare checks, he should’ve been at home, encouraging his kids to go to school, and looking for a job to help pay for daily expenses.

Character Interactions (Bob Ewell)

Bob Ewell’s Interactions:

The Ewell’s are Maycomb’s example of what not to be, and how not to act. The Ewells make themselves look bad. For example, in Chapter 23, Bob Ewell spits on Atticus’ face. At home, when Jem and Scout hear what happened, all Atticus says is “I wish that Bob Ewell wouldn’t chew tobacco.” Bob Ewell presented him in a bad way, but Atticus replied with dignity.

The trial helps the community better understand the implications of poverty, segregation, and social injustice. Like it says in the book, “I thought he (the judge) was leaning a little to our side” -Reverend Sykes

Because of the amount of time (hours on end) that the jury (shown above) was out of the courtroom trying to decide what to do, this shows that the jury was lenient in their decision, and it wasn’t an easy decision for them to make.

I would say that the Ewell’s almost made it clear that Tom Robinson was innocent. Because in the trial it was so apparent that Mayella was forcing Tom on her, it made her look bad. Also, because it became clear throughout the trial that Bob Ewell was responsible for beating his daughter, which cemented their already less-than-desirable reputation forever.

The other main interaction besides the trial in the book involving Bob Ewell was when Bob came after Jem and Scout and tried to kill them. After the play at school, Jem and Scout are walking home together, and they hear footsteps behind them. They think it’s Cecil Jacobs, and Scout yells, “Cecil Jacobs is a big fat hen!” But then, Bob starts to run at them, and they try to run away. Bob catches up, and tries to cut Scout. If she wouldn’t have had her ham costume on from the play, it might have killed her. Jem tries to fight Bob, and breaks his arm in the meantime. Had it not been for Boo Radley, who comes and saves the kids, they may have died.

This act, initiated by Bob Ewell, was purposed to hurt Atticus in an indirect way. Bob Ewell wanted to find a way to get revenge on Atticus for the trial, and his way of doing it was to come after the kids, because he was too scared to go directly to Atticus.

Is Bob Ewell Static, Dynamic, Flat, or Round?

Bob Ewell certainly isn’t dynamic or round.

Throughout the book, Bob Ewell stays the same. The Bob Ewell that you find at the beginning of the trial is the same Bob Ewell that you find at the end. Not much changes over the course of the trial.

Bob Ewell believes that he is above the black people, which is why he believes that he can take Tom Robinson to court, and win. Bob thinks that he will look like a hero in front of the people of Maycomb, saving a young girl from a black man that tried to rape her. When Atticus disproves that during the trial, and makes it apparent that Bob is the one beating and raping Mayella. Bob vows to get revenge with Atticus.

However, Bob is a coward, and won’t meet with Atticus face to face. So, he goes after Jem and Scout on their way home from the play at school. He tries to kill them, but Boo Radley steps in, and kills Bob Ewell. Without the help of Boo Radley, Jem and Scout would’ve been killed.

So in conclusion, Bob is very flat and static. He keeps his ways the same, and doesn’t change his opinions at all throughout the book.

Who Am I? (Bob Ewell)

Bob Ewell is a classic example of poverty in Maycomb. He and his children live by the town garbage dump in a house made of plank walls and corrugated iron, that rested on four chunks of limestone.

Bob Ewell is an example of poverty in To Kill a Mockingbird. It is rumored throughout the book that the welfare checks that he gets to provide for his family are used to buy alcohol for himself. The Ewell children rarely bathe, and are usually hungry. His children make their own shoes out of old car tires from the dump. Bob’s children (which the book says are “uncountable”), play at the dump during the day, and are always sick because of their exposure to the trash in the dump.

Scout says in a quote from the book, “(he) probably made himself unique in the annals of the nineteen-thirties: he was the only man I had ever heard of that was fired from the WPA for laziness.” Bob cannot hold a job to help support his family, and bring them out of the poverty and the conditions that they are in.

Introduction and Purpose

Why should we be concerned about poverty in America today?

What does poverty mean today in America?  What about in the world? What effects does poverty have on the world, as well as on America, today? Why should we be concerned this issue, and how can we help to prevent this social injustice?

How many Americans does poverty affect?

The social justice issue of poverty is important because in America today, about 50 million Americans are considered “under the poverty line”. The “poverty line” is considered an annual income of $23,283 for a family of four (two parents, two children). It is important to consider this issue, because in America, it clearly has a large effect on a big number of Americans. Also, there is a 14.6% food insecurity rate in America. Food insecurity is defined as: the state of being without reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food.

What is this social justice issue important?

This social justice issue is important because in America today, about 35 million Americans (or 14% of Americans), are considered “living under the poverty line.” It is important to be aware of the effects of poverty in our country today and to know what we can do to help (census.gov), because poverty affects a large percentage of the people in our country.  Infants that are born into poverty are more likely to have a low birth weight, which makes them more susceptible to physical and mental disabilities. Also, parents struggling through poverty are more typically harsher on their children, and the people that they interact with, and are more often stressed than a parent under normal financial conditions would be (cliffsnotes.com).

So, poverty causes hardships for the people living in it.

What would it take for people to raise themselves out of poverty?

In the book, Is Poverty a Serious Threat?, it states that the average American “poor family”, is supported by an 800 hour work year, averaging out to about 16 hours of work per year. If every “poor family” worked 2,000 hour work years, or 40 hours of work per week, 75% of poor families wouldn’t be in what is considered poverty in America.

What kind of organizations are there to help poverty in America, as well as worldwide?

MercyCorp (http://www.mercycorps.org/about-us/our-work) is an organization that helps to fight oppression, poverty, and suffering by working to build productive communities in the United States, as well as worldwide.

Raising funds for MercyCorp would provide them with the financial help they need to execute their “strategy for change”. Their “strategy for change” involves helping disaster and conflict areas, areas in political unrest, as well as providing relief for places after crisis’. MercyCorp promotes sustainable change by supporting movements that are initiated by communities. They also look for innovations that could be used to fight poverty and cause lasting change.