A Re-­Vision of To Kill a Mockingbird and Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

Abstract

In this paper the author argues for a “re-visioning” of two young adult literature texts by examine the ways in which race is constructed/deconstructed within <em>To Kill a Mockingbird</em> and <em>Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry. </em>The piece begins by examining how the books are perceived in mass culture, then leads into an analysis of how race is (de)constructed through key scenes related to family, history and land ownership. By examining the two pieces of literature in tandem, differing ideologies become apparent. Implications for the teaching of these texts in light of these ideologies, the selective tradition, and authenticity in the selection of multicultural texts conclude this piece.

TeachingTo Kill a MockingbirdToday: Coming to Terms With Race, Racism, and America's Novel

“…Indeed, our own favoring of TKAM in the U.S. educational system as a canonical text or as “our national novel” indexes another example of institutional racism, where we privilege a/the white perspective of and about race and racism and subtly reinforce the status quo of racial ordering (Patel, ). Falter (), in comparing TKAM with Mildred D. Taylor's Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry , suggested that the latter is the more authentic text about race (having been told by an African American author) but that selective tradition and race have elevated the former. Likewise, I wonder whether the same can be said about other texts about race that tend to circulate in classrooms to a seemingly lesser degree than TKAM , such as Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, Beloved by Toni Morrison, and Black Boy: A Record of Childhood and Youth by Richard Wright.…”