Reading Response 8-28-09

[jwolf]

I believe Huck still uses the term “nigger” when talking about black
people because of the environment he has lived in. Huck is use to
referring to black people as “niggers” and because it has become
second nature, he is not going to just cease in saying it. It is his
everyday language and the title he gives to blacks. Mark Twain
demonstrates throughout the novel that characteristics and
personalities are often due to an individual’s upbringing and place in
society. Huck is born into low class society without any wealth or
schooling background. It is through his childhood, not rudeness or
maliciousness, that he may be a tad ignorant or uninformed. Huck is
still a young boy with backwards views that have been ingrained in
him. This creates the situations where Huck just refers to Jim in that
word because that is how he knows to talk to Jim. Huck still cares for
Jim as a friend just as much or even more as he would for a white
friend. An example of how Huck refers to Jim as a “nigger” is when he
says “(Jim) had an uncommon level head for a nigger”. This sentence is
nothing more than Huck respecting Jim as a person regardless of his
race. Huck knows that the black stereotype is not true, but the word
“nigger” is how he refers to Jim; it is not that the word also defines
Jim.