Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Where the Crawdads Sing, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Survival, Necessity, and Violence
Independence vs. Human Connection
Education, Coming of Age, and Adulthood
Prejudice, Intolerance, and Acceptance
Summary
Analysis
During the next day of Kya’s trial, there is a disruption in the courthouse when Jumpin’ and Mabel walk into the “white area” of the seating and sit next to Tate, directly behind Kya. When the bailiff tells Judge Sims what has happened, Sims forces him to make an announcement that anybody can sit anywhere in his courthouse and that if there are people who dislike this, they can leave. Hearing this and seeing Mabel and Jumpin’, Kya experiences a rare feeling of hope and resilience.
Again, Barkley Cove’s racism and intolerance comes to the forefront of the novel, as people are scandalized simply because Jumpin’ and Mabel want to sit near Kya to show their support. That Judge Sims scolds the spectators for making a big deal out of this is significant, since it suggests that he has no tolerance for discrimination—a fact that might bring itself to bear on Kya’s trial, since Kya herself faces certain forms of prejudice.
Themes
Eric calls his second witness to the stand. His name is Dr. Steward Cone, the coroner who examined Chase’s corpse. Throughout the questioning, Eric establishes not only that Chase died between midnight and two in the morning on October 30th, but that Dr. Cone found a collection of red fibers on his coat. These fibers, Eric demonstrates, match the red hat that Ed and Joe found in Kya’s home. Once he establishes this, he cedes the floor to Tom, who asks Dr. Cone how long these fibers could have clung to Chase’s coat. Following this line of questioning, he gets Dr. Cone to make clear that the fibers could have been attached to the coat for as long as four years. Tom also manages to get Dr. Cone to say that Chase’s injuries made no indication that anyone pushed him through the hole in the tower.
Tom’s main line of defense is to establish that none of the points Eric brings up during the prosecution serve as concrete evidence that Kya murdered Chase. In keeping with this, he proves that the red fibers found on Chase’s coat don’t actually implicate Kya at all, since they could have rubbed off on him as long as four years ago. However, what readers know that nobody else does is that Kya didn’t have the red hat until shortly before Chase’s death, since Tate gave it to her not long after Chase attempted to rape her. Still, without any actual facts, it’s impossible to say whether or not Kya killed Chase, let alone why she would do this in the first place.
Themes
