Harper Lee uses different characters to outline the significance of social status in Maycomb society. Scout’s fresh and pure mind contrasting with Bob Ewell’s filthy and uncivilized attitudes: ‘The name Ewell gave me a queasy feeling.’ Yet his white skin gives him superiority over all Blackman in Maycomb society: ‘Maycomb had wasted no time in getting Mr. Ewell’s views on Tom’s death and passing them along through that English channel of gossip.’ Maycomb’s society has closely entwined relationships that are determined by skin colour. The segregation caused by the tradition of racial prejudice and allows Bob Ewell to affect the justice of white society by his lies. The story of Tom Robinson’s conviction is the foundation of Harper Lee’s attack against the racial prejudice of the Southern communities. It presents a complete failure of humanity in the white community as a large, and it is ironic that Tom is in this situation because he was able to perceive Mayella’s loneliness and respond to it in a generous way: ‘She asked me to give her a kiss on the cheek sir.’ Harper Lee used characterization to contruct Tom Robinson as a kind, chivalrous, honest and modest man. ‘You all know of our dear brother Tom Robinson. He has been a kind and faithful member of First Purchase since he was a boy.’ This emphazies the injustice and inhumane views of the white society towards the coloured people in Maycomb. Harper Lee uses the character-Scout to tell the story from the view of young children who supply fresh, unaffected and pure opinions. A good example when Scout describes the way the news of Tom’s death was broadcast by the newspaper. ‘To Maycomb, Tom’s death was typical of a nigger. Typical of a nigger to cut and run. Typical of a nigger’s mentality to have no plan, no thought for the future, just run at the first chance he got.’ This suggests not only the brutal way the blacks are treated but also their loss of individuality and how invisible they are as people.
Education in Maycomb society is also shown in the novel. The school system and lessons the children receive are gently mocked: ‘People didn’t seem to go to school to achieve highly, they went to school because it was a school.’ This suggests that schooling are not seen as important as it is nowadays. Flexibility for independent views and thoughts are limited as Scout says: ‘but the prospect of spending nine months refraining from reading and writing made me want to run away’. Miss Caroline stopped Scout in developing her own sense of intelligence and independence, and does her best to prevent her progress: ‘Now tell your father not to teach you any more’. The attitudes displayed by Miss Caroline are opposed to the ideas of the book. Harper Lee is suggesting that schools and teachers in Maycomb society gives children a fixed road to take for the early years of their life and when Scout turns off the road she is told off : ‘I mumbled that I was sorry and retired meditating on my crime.’ The children learn lessons of real value from other sources, for example when Jem and Scout so heavily judge Boo Radley but discover he is a kind and lonely man: ‘Boo isn’t a scary man after all is he Jem?’ The fact that they have learnt from these incidents reflects the progress of the young society of Maycomb against traditional, biased views.
Women in Maycomb are expected to conform to traditional ideas about Southern femininity. Scout’s courageous and bold character challenges the expectations of being a traditional woman. When the story starts, there are parts when the reader assumes Scout is a boy. This highlights the moral of the novel about judging people and also emphasis that Scout and her family are breaking the tradition. As the novel progresses Scout realizes with the help of Atticus that that she should grow out of punching people but never the less should stand up for what she believes in, and step into the role of a woman of Maycomb: ‘Atticus told me not to get in any more fights, so I walked away.’ Women have a constructed role to play in family life and are not expected to achieve highly: ‘Very few women worked because they were mot expected to.’ Aunt Alexandra is a typical example and her inability to see when she is wrong is her greatest flaw. But when Bob Ewell attacks Jem and Scout, she admits her guilt when she sees it: ‘I had a feeling about tonight- this is my fault. She began I should have-’. She represents all the basic failings of Maycomb ladies with her ‘river boat’ boarding school manners. Harper Lee portrays women as ‘mistaken’ in their attitudes towards equality.
Local hierarchy is an important part of the structure of Maycomb’s society. Blacks are positioned at the bottom of the hierarchical scale due to the unfairness, discrimination and prejudice in Maycomb society; Yet This racial attitude seems to be only one-sided throughout most of Maycomb’s black community. Instead of wanting revenge for the amount of pain, suffering, and lack of fairness that they are suffering from the whites constantly, They seem more interested in working towards a peaceful integration between them and the whites despite all of these historical atrocities and animosity. Proving, once again, that the black community is more understanding and on no account should be treated with disrespect and derogatory. Local hierarchy keeps people from different sections in the community in isolation from one another. This is shown throughout the novel and the idea seems to be very influential in Maycomb society. Calpurnia is a good example; she is a deprived member of Maycomb society on account of her colour but yet she is able to reprimand Scout about her treatment towards Walter Cunningham who is at the lower end of the hierarchical scale: ‘He is just like any other white boy Scout.’ She then shows her support in equality and shows her disagreement on the general view about the differences between different social status: ‘Just because he is poor it doesn’t position him below anyone else.’ Yet Scout is ingrained with the town’s hierarchical attitude : ‘Walter is not company, only a guest because he is a Cunningham.’ So early on in the book we see signs of Maycomb’s hierarchical attitudes being passed on to Scout. However later on in the novel we find Scout is educated out of this point of view and is deeply upset when Aunt Alexandra refers to Walter as ‘trash’. This suggests hope for the future of Maycomb as the younger generations will develop independent views on equality. While the novel realizes all traditional tragic elements of Southern fiction, it also moves forward into a future that sees the South relinquishing these slowly, without losing its sense of community and identity.
Maycomb’s society is controlled by segregation, hierarchy, prejudice, family, loneliness and isolation. These themes unify into the moral landscape of a small town. Within the novel we live for a while in Maycomb and get to know its inhabitants. We begin to understand the moral tone of the town with its hypocrisies, its self-interest and its fear of change. We see young Scout develop moral courage that helps the reader see hope for the people of Maycomb finding life beyond discrimination, segregation and racial prejudice and a way into justice and equality. In a world in which innocence is threatened by injustice, cruelty, prejudice, and hatred, goodness can prevail in the form of sympathy, understanding, and common sense, as evidenced by how the townspeople’s affectionate willingness to help one another enables them to overcome the intrusion of these Gothic elements into their simple small-town lives.
