Women were discriminated against in Alabama in the 1930s. They had only been granted the right to vote in 1920 and were not allowed to serve on juries. They were not expected to have a career but to get married and have children. Women were expected to follow stricter moral and behavioural codes than men. Lee's treatment of gender is controversial. Some people argue that Lee doesn't really question the role of women in society in the novel; in fact, she appears to reinforce the attitudes of the time. But others disagree.

When Scout and Atticus discuss women not being allowed to serve on juries in Alabama, some people argue that through Atticus's reaction Lee is reinforcing the attitude that women are not intellectually or emotionally capable of serving on a jury.

Some people have argued that Lee, through the way she portrays Mayella Ewell, is suggesting that there are two classes of women in society: respectable women like Miss Maudle and '"White trash" like Mayella Ewell. They argue that Lee doesn't really encourage us to sympathise with Mayella or see her as a victim. Others disagree and say Lee, through the comments of Scout and Tom Robinson (who says he feels sorry for her), encourages us to feel sympathy for Mayella.

Southern ladies

Read an interview with three women about growing up in the South in the 1930s. Click:

In To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee resists some of the conventional stereotypes of women. Characters like Miss Maudie are opinionated, and Scout spends her time on the same activities as Jem and Dill. However, the text reflects some of the gender expectations in the 1950s.

In our culture we are used to girls and women being presented as:
• passive
• inside (they're usually the ones that do indoor activities in the home or wait in castles and rooms to be rescued)
• sensitive
• private
while boys and men are presented as:
• active
• mobile and outside
• rational
• public
In the two extracts below, certain qualities are given to men and certain qualities to women. Do these qualities match the above customary expectations of the roles of men and women? (For example, the women are inside the home having a private meeting. They are presented as "rocking gently" which immediately conjures up a picture of woman inside her home on a rocking chair. We could conclude that females are presented as being inside and private.)

Extract 1
'… Miss Maudie can't serve on a jury because she's a woman.'
'You mean women in Alabama can't -?' I was indignant.
'I do. I guess it's to protect our frail ladies from sordid cases like Tom's. Besides,' Atticus grinned, 'I doubt if we'd ever get a complete case tried - the ladies'd be interrupting to ask questions.'
Jem and I laughed ... Perhaps our fore fathers were wise.'

Extract 2
There was no doubt about it; I must soon enter this world, where on its surface fragrant ladies rocked slowly, fanned gently, and drank cool water.
But I was more at home in my father's world. People like Mr Heck Tate did not trap you with innocent questions to make fun of you; even Jem was not highly critical unless you said something stupid. Ladies seemed to live in faint horror of men, seemed unwilling to approve wholeheartedly of them. But I liked them. There was something about them, no matter how much they cussed and drank and gambled and chewed; no matter how undelectable they were, there was something about them that I instinctively liked ...