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Essay / Dehumanization In Huck Finn - 1099
Run and crush the knives, three of them.' So I did it” (Twain, 561). This quote is an example of Tom Sawyer dehumanizing Huck essentially by telling him that he lacks the human quality of understanding. This quote is strangely familiar. It actually looks like the following. “I see that there is no point in wasting words: you cannot teach a Negro to argue. So I stopped” (Twain, 373). There is a sort of parallel here: Huck is to Tom as Jim is to Huck. It seems Twain did this on purpose. As if he wanted the reader to realize this parallel. The choice to use the word learn instead of teach could simply be a matter of dialect, but I think otherwise. I think this was used in both cases to create the connection. Huck dehumanizes Jim by saying he doesn't have the human quality to learn and Tom does the same to Huck. Because of the connection, I'd say Tom puts Huck down twice as harshly. Not only is he bad at learning and understanding, but he's about as good as a black.