The Crucible

The Crucible by Arthur Miller

Miller’s The Crucible speaks to a society where narrow mindedness and provincial thinking clouds vision. The Crucible takes place in 1600s where Abigail Williams accuses multiple women in the town of Salem of witchcraft. The judges in the town support Abigail for all of her accusations and blindly accept what she says merely because she says that her word is trustworthy. 

Miller’s book speaks directly to McCarthyism, but the message still holds true today. In an era of social media, it is all too easy to only listen to what one wants to hear. Just like how Judge Danforth only saw the evidence to help him find witches and how McCarthy only saw the evidence to help him find Communists, people can cherry pick the information that supports their point of view. When Facebook finds news articles that a person might be interested in, it isn’t looking for the most credible piece of information, it is looking for what the user wants to see based on previous preferences. Facebook’s current solution for fighting fake news is to tag questionable pieces in order to provide context. However, the mere-exposure effect shows that simply reading the headline plants that seed of false information. Individuals can’t get their news from just social media. They need to make sure that their news comes from credible and respected sources to get all types of information, not just the ones that users are exposed to through their friends.

The Handmaid's Tale

The Handmaid’s Tale  by Margaret Atwood

Fiction

Under the religious military dictatorship, the Republic of Gilead, Offred lives as a Handmaid to serve her Commander (the head male of the household). Women occupy one of five roles in society. Four of the roles available are that of wives, Aunts (teachers), Marthas (maids), and lower-class workers. Pollution and disease has made many of the Commander’s wives sterile which opens up a new position for women in society, as a Handmaid. Handmaids are required by law to have sex with their Commanders once a month in hopes of getting pregnant. The women in the Republic of Gilead are unable to read, write, wear what they want, go outside alone, and they have to obey their Commander. Through a series of flashbacks, Offred tells the story of how the Republic of Gilead slowly came to be as women’s rights were gradually stripped away. Offred laments how passively people accepted their loss of power and didn’t take action until it was too late.

I am Malala

I am Malala by Malala Yousafzai

Nonfiction

Malala Yousafzai obtained international renown when, at the age of fifteen, she was shot in the head by the Taliban for speaking out for girls’ rights to education. In this book, readers are able to understand her origin story. Through her beautiful prose, Malala depicts her serene childhood in Swat and paints pictures of snow covered mountains and trickling streams. We also get to learn more about Malala’s family history, and the amount of support she received from her dad. Malala also shows the atrocities committed by the Taliban with a bit of history thrown in. Driven to fight for her rights and not wanting to stay silent, young Malala delivered speeches and wrote in the diary for BBC, both of which led to the day she was shot in the head. Since then, Malala has continued to fight for education for all, notably having won a Nobel Prize. All of this is baffling when you realize that she is only twenty. Many only know of the time she was shot in the head and that she won a Nobel Prize. Here we get her personal history and some history on the conflict in the Middle East. Malala’s story serves as an inspiration to all, especially young girls, and as a testament to the importance of education.