Q: What is a Cultural Icon?
A: A Cultural Icon can be nearly anything - a book, photograph, person, logo - that is representative of certain parts of societal ideals, values, or what were at one point in time considered societal norms. Books that serve as cultural icons can be representative of certain time periods or important events in history. Often, a book that has been censored, banned, burned and prohibited can serve as a Cultural Icon by showing the fears of the people of the time.
A: A Cultural Icon can be nearly anything - a book, photograph, person, logo - that is representative of certain parts of societal ideals, values, or what were at one point in time considered societal norms. Books that serve as cultural icons can be representative of certain time periods or important events in history. Often, a book that has been censored, banned, burned and prohibited can serve as a Cultural Icon by showing the fears of the people of the time.
Watch the above video from CBS' '60 Minutes' on how a Southern publisher's sanitized edition of "Huckleberry Finn" replaces the N-word with "slave" over 200 times. Twain's book is still a source of debate on the use of the controversial word in American society.
Controversy - A Banned and Challenged Book Throughout Its History
a.) Language
Due to the use - and what some call the 'excessive' use - of the word 'Nigger' in Huckleberry Finn, the book has come under great scrutiny.
b.) Racism & Racial Stereotypes
It has been argued that Huck Finn is a racist work, while other critics argue exactly the opposite - that Twain was attempting to highlight the inequalities and social injustices facing freed African Americans in the south after the end of slavery. In her article 'More Trouble for Huck Finn,' Janet S. Schwartz points out that Twain was fully aware of the issue at the time he penned Huck Finn:
“The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was published twenty years after the close of the war. What was not a dead issue was the way free blacks were treated in the South after the war was over. New research has uncovered some other writing Mark Twain as doing at the same time he was penning The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. At this same time, he was corresponding with his friend, George Washington Cable, who was working in the South to eradicate the social injustices against free blacks.”
In Huckleberry Finn, Twain attempted to paint a realistic portrait of life in a Pre- and Post- slavery south. As said Julius Lester in ‘Morality and Adventures of “Huckleberry Finn”’, ‘In the character of Huckleberry Finn, Twain evoked something poignant and real in the American psyche […]. I strongly believe that even if this title is in fact a racist work, which I do not believe it to be, it still serves as an exemplary of a cultural icon in book format due to its significant contribution to history through its written preservation of life and beliefs during a dark and tumultuous time period in our country's past. It is important as an educational tool as it can help readers understand the harsh injustices faced by African Americans in this country. It also helps us to connect with people, values and beliefs of the past, and therefore understand their language, moral and beliefs in a different light.
One major issue that many critics have found fault with is supposed racial stereotyping within the book. It is argued that the slave Jim has been portrayed by Twain in a 'minstrel' tradition, which references minstrel shows that date back to the early 1800s. Minstrel shows mocked African Americans and often depicted them as superstitious and ignorant.
The superstitious beliefs held by both Huck and Jim, which help to bring the two closer together in the book, have been perceived as a stereotype of southern African Americans during this time period. For example, Twain writes that "Jim had a hair-ball as big as your first, which had been took out of the fourth stomach of an ox, and he used to do magic with it. He said there was a spirit inside of it, and it knowed everything." Here, Twain could possibly be mocking common superstitions of the day that were prevalent in the American South.
Jim's superstitions can be found throughout the book, including his belief that giving a hairball 'oracle' a quarter it would talk to him. Later on, when Huck is bitten by a snake, Jim tells the young boy to 'chop off the snake's head, throw it away, and sin the body and roast a piece of it.' Jim eats it, and says it is a cure. There is also Jim's belief that idiots cannot be stung by bees, perhaps also satiring ignorance, as well: "Jim said that bees won't sting idiots, but I didn't believe that, because I tried them lots of times myself and they wouldn't sting me.” "
a.) Language
Due to the use - and what some call the 'excessive' use - of the word 'Nigger' in Huckleberry Finn, the book has come under great scrutiny.
b.) Racism & Racial Stereotypes
It has been argued that Huck Finn is a racist work, while other critics argue exactly the opposite - that Twain was attempting to highlight the inequalities and social injustices facing freed African Americans in the south after the end of slavery. In her article 'More Trouble for Huck Finn,' Janet S. Schwartz points out that Twain was fully aware of the issue at the time he penned Huck Finn:
“The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was published twenty years after the close of the war. What was not a dead issue was the way free blacks were treated in the South after the war was over. New research has uncovered some other writing Mark Twain as doing at the same time he was penning The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. At this same time, he was corresponding with his friend, George Washington Cable, who was working in the South to eradicate the social injustices against free blacks.”
In Huckleberry Finn, Twain attempted to paint a realistic portrait of life in a Pre- and Post- slavery south. As said Julius Lester in ‘Morality and Adventures of “Huckleberry Finn”’, ‘In the character of Huckleberry Finn, Twain evoked something poignant and real in the American psyche […]. I strongly believe that even if this title is in fact a racist work, which I do not believe it to be, it still serves as an exemplary of a cultural icon in book format due to its significant contribution to history through its written preservation of life and beliefs during a dark and tumultuous time period in our country's past. It is important as an educational tool as it can help readers understand the harsh injustices faced by African Americans in this country. It also helps us to connect with people, values and beliefs of the past, and therefore understand their language, moral and beliefs in a different light.
One major issue that many critics have found fault with is supposed racial stereotyping within the book. It is argued that the slave Jim has been portrayed by Twain in a 'minstrel' tradition, which references minstrel shows that date back to the early 1800s. Minstrel shows mocked African Americans and often depicted them as superstitious and ignorant.
The superstitious beliefs held by both Huck and Jim, which help to bring the two closer together in the book, have been perceived as a stereotype of southern African Americans during this time period. For example, Twain writes that "Jim had a hair-ball as big as your first, which had been took out of the fourth stomach of an ox, and he used to do magic with it. He said there was a spirit inside of it, and it knowed everything." Here, Twain could possibly be mocking common superstitions of the day that were prevalent in the American South.
Jim's superstitions can be found throughout the book, including his belief that giving a hairball 'oracle' a quarter it would talk to him. Later on, when Huck is bitten by a snake, Jim tells the young boy to 'chop off the snake's head, throw it away, and sin the body and roast a piece of it.' Jim eats it, and says it is a cure. There is also Jim's belief that idiots cannot be stung by bees, perhaps also satiring ignorance, as well: "Jim said that bees won't sting idiots, but I didn't believe that, because I tried them lots of times myself and they wouldn't sting me.” "
c.) Censorship and Banned Book Status
Huck Finn has been banned and censored countless times over the past one-hundred years. Some examples of banned events include the following:
• Attack by the NAACP that resulted in a court order that prohibited the book's use as required reading in New York public schools. This was not an isolated incident, and further recurrences of this lasted until the mid-1970's. The NAACP referred to the book as being 'racially offensive.' [1957]
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Adapted, published by John A. Wallace, was created in order to 'make the novel less embarasing to young black readers and more acceptable to their parents by eradicating the 200-odd uses in it of the offensive word, 'nigger,' and removing or re-writing passages where blacks are portrayed as inferior to whites.'
• Barely a month afters its U.S. publication, a committee formed from the Concord Public Library banned the book, proclaiming it to be 'flippant, irreverent, and trashy.' Futhermore, a committee member went so far as to state that the book 'deals with a series of adventures of a very low grade of morality; it is couched in the language of a rough, ignorant dialect...The whole book is of a class tha tis more profitable for the slums than it is for respectable people, and it is trans of the veriest sort.'
• 1885: "[Huckleberry Finn] is rough, coarse, and inelegant, dealing with a series of experiences not elevating, the whole book being more suites to the slums than to intelligent, respectable people." - Boston Evening Transcript.
• In 1902, the Denver Public Library banned - using their words, 'excluded,' the book from an approved list of books for boys due to its 'questionable morality.'
• Also in 1902, the Omaha Public Library also banned the book, stating that it had a 'pernicious influence on young people.'
• In 1905, the head librarian of Brooklyn Public Library placed the title on a restricted book list. Her belief was that 'Huck was a deceitful boy; that he not only itched but scratched,' and that he said 'sweat' when he should have said 'perspiration.'
• In 1995 in Washington, DC, the book was banned from the classroom of an All-Girls School because students and parents felt that the educators at the institution were 'overly sensitive to racial issues.'
• In 1996, Shalon Bradford, a student from Federal Way, WA, challenged the book's required reading status at her school, as she was offended by the use of the 'n' word.
• Also in 1996, Upper Dublin High School in Pennsylvania decided to drop the book from their required reading list after African American parents complained that the use of the 'n' word made their children uncomfortable.
• In July of 1996, the school board of Lindale, Texas banned Huck Finn, along with 31 other titles from an AP reading list because the book and others 'conflicted with the values of the community.' One school board member, Gary Camp, stated that the books banned were 'unsuitable for boys fifteen and sixteen years of age.'
• In 1997 in Columbus, Indiana (my hometown - I actually remember this happening!) members of an AFrian American community protested the use of Huck Finn in the school's high school classes. The Reverend Charles Sims stated that exposing the book to African American children was 'degrading' and 'insensitive.'
• In 2011, a new version of Huck Finn was published by NewSouth Books wherein the 'n' word was changed to 'slave.'
• In 1998, parents at a school in Tempe, Arizona sued the school district for having Huck Finn as a required reading title. Parents were offended by the use of the 'n' word within the book and found it politically incorrect.
• In 2003, students from a school in Seattle, Washington opposed the class reading and discussing the novel as it went against their own personal religious, moral and political beliefs. They stated that they del tit was 'degrading an utterily unconscionable.'
• In 2011, a new version of Huck Finn was published by NewSouth Books wherein the 'n' word was changed to 'slave.'
Satire - Southern Life, Morals and Beliefs
Huckleberry Finn challenged the morals and beliefs of readers of the time, and helps readers today to understand the thoughts and common values of an earlier era. Twain uses Huckleberry Finn as a satire to showcase his views on a post-Civil War South, where impending Jim Crow laws and actions towards African Americans were still greatly oppressive. Twain also attacks wealth and class, romantic literature, laziness, southern hospitality and religion - in particular, Christianity. It is interesting to point out that when the book was first banned in the late 1800s and into the early 1900s, it was not banned based on its scatting critique and satire of the Southern way of life, nor for any racial content or language, but was mostly banned due to moral beliefs.
The character of Huck's father, Pap, who in essence turns the young boy into a type of slave himself by kidnapping him and forcing him to move away to Illinois is a parallel to the lives of slaves depicted in the rest of the book. The satire of behavior towards African Americans in Huck Finn, this instance in particular set prior to 13th Amendment, can be seen in the very first chapter of the book. In the beginning of the novel, it is stated that Miss Watson, who was Huck's co-guardian, '...fetched the niggers in and had prayers, and then everybody went to bed.' (5) While attempting to show the woman's religious beliefs and Christian charity in inviting her slaves to prayer and attempting to introduce religion into their lives, it also depicts the hypocrisy behind this so-called Christian woman who was in fact a slave owner.
Huck Finn has been banned and censored countless times over the past one-hundred years. Some examples of banned events include the following:
• Attack by the NAACP that resulted in a court order that prohibited the book's use as required reading in New York public schools. This was not an isolated incident, and further recurrences of this lasted until the mid-1970's. The NAACP referred to the book as being 'racially offensive.' [1957]
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Adapted, published by John A. Wallace, was created in order to 'make the novel less embarasing to young black readers and more acceptable to their parents by eradicating the 200-odd uses in it of the offensive word, 'nigger,' and removing or re-writing passages where blacks are portrayed as inferior to whites.'
• Barely a month afters its U.S. publication, a committee formed from the Concord Public Library banned the book, proclaiming it to be 'flippant, irreverent, and trashy.' Futhermore, a committee member went so far as to state that the book 'deals with a series of adventures of a very low grade of morality; it is couched in the language of a rough, ignorant dialect...The whole book is of a class tha tis more profitable for the slums than it is for respectable people, and it is trans of the veriest sort.'
• 1885: "[Huckleberry Finn] is rough, coarse, and inelegant, dealing with a series of experiences not elevating, the whole book being more suites to the slums than to intelligent, respectable people." - Boston Evening Transcript.
• In 1902, the Denver Public Library banned - using their words, 'excluded,' the book from an approved list of books for boys due to its 'questionable morality.'
• Also in 1902, the Omaha Public Library also banned the book, stating that it had a 'pernicious influence on young people.'
• In 1905, the head librarian of Brooklyn Public Library placed the title on a restricted book list. Her belief was that 'Huck was a deceitful boy; that he not only itched but scratched,' and that he said 'sweat' when he should have said 'perspiration.'
• In 1995 in Washington, DC, the book was banned from the classroom of an All-Girls School because students and parents felt that the educators at the institution were 'overly sensitive to racial issues.'
• In 1996, Shalon Bradford, a student from Federal Way, WA, challenged the book's required reading status at her school, as she was offended by the use of the 'n' word.
• Also in 1996, Upper Dublin High School in Pennsylvania decided to drop the book from their required reading list after African American parents complained that the use of the 'n' word made their children uncomfortable.
• In July of 1996, the school board of Lindale, Texas banned Huck Finn, along with 31 other titles from an AP reading list because the book and others 'conflicted with the values of the community.' One school board member, Gary Camp, stated that the books banned were 'unsuitable for boys fifteen and sixteen years of age.'
• In 1997 in Columbus, Indiana (my hometown - I actually remember this happening!) members of an AFrian American community protested the use of Huck Finn in the school's high school classes. The Reverend Charles Sims stated that exposing the book to African American children was 'degrading' and 'insensitive.'
• In 2011, a new version of Huck Finn was published by NewSouth Books wherein the 'n' word was changed to 'slave.'
• In 1998, parents at a school in Tempe, Arizona sued the school district for having Huck Finn as a required reading title. Parents were offended by the use of the 'n' word within the book and found it politically incorrect.
• In 2003, students from a school in Seattle, Washington opposed the class reading and discussing the novel as it went against their own personal religious, moral and political beliefs. They stated that they del tit was 'degrading an utterily unconscionable.'
• In 2011, a new version of Huck Finn was published by NewSouth Books wherein the 'n' word was changed to 'slave.'
Satire - Southern Life, Morals and Beliefs
Huckleberry Finn challenged the morals and beliefs of readers of the time, and helps readers today to understand the thoughts and common values of an earlier era. Twain uses Huckleberry Finn as a satire to showcase his views on a post-Civil War South, where impending Jim Crow laws and actions towards African Americans were still greatly oppressive. Twain also attacks wealth and class, romantic literature, laziness, southern hospitality and religion - in particular, Christianity. It is interesting to point out that when the book was first banned in the late 1800s and into the early 1900s, it was not banned based on its scatting critique and satire of the Southern way of life, nor for any racial content or language, but was mostly banned due to moral beliefs.
The character of Huck's father, Pap, who in essence turns the young boy into a type of slave himself by kidnapping him and forcing him to move away to Illinois is a parallel to the lives of slaves depicted in the rest of the book. The satire of behavior towards African Americans in Huck Finn, this instance in particular set prior to 13th Amendment, can be seen in the very first chapter of the book. In the beginning of the novel, it is stated that Miss Watson, who was Huck's co-guardian, '...fetched the niggers in and had prayers, and then everybody went to bed.' (5) While attempting to show the woman's religious beliefs and Christian charity in inviting her slaves to prayer and attempting to introduce religion into their lives, it also depicts the hypocrisy behind this so-called Christian woman who was in fact a slave owner.