Discuss how the historical, political and social setting of Harper Lees :: English Literature

Discuss how the historical, political and social identifyting of Harper Lees novel To cancel out a Mockingbird contributes to the fears that are present in Maycomb County.Maycomb County had recently been told that it had nothing to fear butfear itself. (Scout Finch, Chapter 1, To Kill a Mockingbird).To Kill A Mockingbird is set in a small town in Maycomb County,Alabama, in the 1930s, which was a dark period in time for America asit had been hit by the Depression. Up until 1929, America had beendoing very well, becoming a much richer country. However in 1929 whenstocks had soared to an all time high, in September they plummeted.This day in recital is known as Black Thursday and is remembered asthe Wall Street Crash of 29. The crash hit communitys interests hardand Americans all over lost a lot of money. Banks had to spend all ofthe money they had on regaining the economy, and agricultural needswere ignored, and didnt seem as important as other things likeindustry. Landowners had l et out land to farmers to grow crops in, andwhen the Wall Street Crash hit them, they precious to regain their land,as it was all they had. Therefore, the crash hit farmers the most andthe productive South was hit very badly because so many people were farmersby trade.There were many black people in the South of America, particularlyAlabama, and there was great racial hatred between them and the faircommunities. The Civil War from 1861-1865 between the North of Americawho wanted the abolition of slavery, and the South who wanted to keepslavery resulted in victory by the North, and slavery was laterabolished. The South had lost its pride, and this was the reason forthe racial hatred. Black people were thought to be inferior to colourpeople and in the 1960s when the novel was written, black communitieswere rioting and causing disturbances to get across the point thatthey were not inferior to white people. After Abolition Black peoplewere terrorised by the Ku Klux Klan, who would b urn them, rape thewomen, and torture the children and the reader is shown an example ofthis in Chapter 15 where a group of white people, go to the countyjail to terrorise Tom Robinson.Maybe this hatred for the Negroes wasnt hatred after all, but broughtabout by fear. As slavery had been abolished, black people wereentitled to the same rights as white people, however they were stillostracised by white people because of their colour.