Injustice is something many people experience in society of today. This usually happens to people of color in today's society when a person is accused of something they didn't do. This is also the case in the book "Lesson Before Dying" by Ernest J. Gains, which is about a young boy named Jefferson who is accused of murder in Lauisanna in the late 1940s and sentenced to the death penalty , without having received a real conviction. chance of a fair trial. He simply happened to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time, in a society full of racial injustice. In this novel, there is a recurring theme that racial injustice causes people to change their view of themselves, simply because of how society treats them. We see this through the use of diction in the novel which is mainly shown when Jefferson is in court. He expresses that he was not given a fair chance to have a real trial with valid evidence. We also see this throw away Jefferson's characterization in the novel once he is accused of the murder. When the book began, Jefferson considered himself innocent, but the longer he spent in prison, the more he began to think of himself as a "pig", even though he is innocent. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essay. First of all, injustice is shown in Gains' novel, "A Lesson Before Dying" when the main character, Jefferson, is put on trial and it is clear. to the reader that he did not have the right to a fair trial. For example, when in court it is stated that "the defense argued that Jefferson was innocent of all charges except being in the wrong place at the wrong time", indicating that he actually did not nothing done but which the court never gave him the opportunity to prove. that he was innocent, they just saw him and because he was colored they automatically thought he was guilty. This goes back to my theme of injustice in the novel, because if they had been fair to him, they would have given him a chance at a fair trial and understood that he was innocent. Additionally, throughout the story we see that Jefferson begins to believe what everyone said about him and what people think of him. This includes them saying he's a pig and he soon starts behaving like one because he starts believing he's a horrible person like people say. For example, when he begins to believe that he is a pig, he begins to behave rudely towards people who try to help him understand that he is not a pig, but a man. He told his teacher Grant, "I'll show you how an old pig eats," and then he "kneeled on the ground, put his head in the bag and began to eat, without using his hands." He even looked like a pig. This explains to my team that injustice can cause people to change their view of themselves because Jefferson knows he was innocent, but because people believed he was guilty, he began to believe it himself. Keep in mind: this is just a sample. Get a custom article now from our expert editors. Get a custom essay a pig. However, it is also important to consider the time period in which this book is based, because in the 1940s, racism was a huge problem and people of color were victims of enormous injustice. This is also a problem in the real world, because when people are found guilty when they are actually innocent,,.