To Still a Mockingbird: Academic Freedom and the Pursuit of Innocence

This essay explores the shifting reception of Harper Lee’s "To Kill a Mockingbird", tracing its transformation from a landmark of anti-racist literature into a book targeted by both conservative and progressive censorship. Focusing on the figure of Atticus Finch—once celebrated as a Civil Rights Movement hero and now often condemned as a racist example of the “white saviour” trope— this essay examines how the widespread use of trigger warnings has reshaped the relationship between literature and academic freedom. "To Still a Mockingbird" argues that the pedagogical reliance on supposedly progressive notions such as “safe space” or “accountability” suppresses critical debate, encouraging a stifling moral orthodoxy.