The Use Of Satire In Tom Sawyer By John Twain

In a society, the majority of the people in the society greatly affects how the minority would act or think. The social pressure created from the majority group would cause the person to conform to the majority. This leads to a group of people to be afraid to think against society’s ideas, which is what Twain criticizes. Twain criticizes society by using satire, which is a literary technique that is used by many writers, it is the use of humor, irony, or exaggeration, to criticize or shame individuals or society in the context of an issue. Satire is a significant literary technique that is used in any written work because satire is a clever way that challenges popular ideas, forcing the audience to look at the ideas being addressed in a new …show more content…
Tom Sawyer is the embodiment of the idea of treatment towards African Americans during the 1800s. In the beginning of the novel the reader already can see that Tom does not have concern over the way Jim is treated, “When we was ten foot off Tom whispered to me, and wanted to tie Jim to the tree for fun... Tom said he slipped Jim’s hat off of his head and hung it on a limb right over him” (15). The reader can start to recognize that Tom does not view African Americans to be significant but rather as a toy, which is the reason why Tom wanted to tie Jim to a tree and misplace his hat. Later in the novel, we see through Tom’s actions that it is blatant that he does not respect Jim. Twain clearly shows this when he states, “And his Aunt Polly she said that when old Miss Watson setting Jim free in her will; and so, sure enough, Tom Sawyer had gone and took all that trouble and bother to set a free nigger free” (277). Tom dismissed the fact that Jim was an actual human being and instead prioritized the adventure he wanted by not informing Huck and Jim of the knowledge he had. Tom took advantage of Jim’s situation and could have possibly compromise Jim’s opportunity of being free. The way that Tom views African Americans is because of how he was raised. Tom Sawyer was brought up by the idea that African Americans are the subordinates and that they are property, this standard way of thinking was caused by society’s norms. Tom is prejudiced as he considers any African American to be insignificant because they are not “human”. Twain shows that Tom is infected with this way of thinking due to what society presumes is correct, causing a once innocent boy to be this corrupt being, who views a group of a certain race to be possessions and because of the way Tom thinks is because of the norm, it leads to the wrongdoings towards African