The Crucible presents a series of power plays between characters and groups of different status. Throughout the play, education, title, luck, age, gender, strength, wealth,
and social connectedness confer power on individuals. In this essay, you will examine
power brokerage-how characters get, use, and maintain power. Choose a major character
from The Crucible and using the "French and Raven's Five Forms of Power" article,
evaluate how that character assumes, utilizes, and maintains (or loses) power throughout
the play. What power bases do they use? How do they use them? Could they have used a
different power base to act with more humanity in the story and mitigate, or lessen, the
abuse of power by themselves or other characters in the play? In what ways do cultural
values or beliefs affect the ways characters use power or make choices? Make sure that
you refer to your character's development of power throughout the play. Cite your evidence
from at least two acts of the play. Make sure that all your assertions are documented by
correctly cited facts (quotations, paraphrases, and summaries of events/characters) from
your sources, and that all assertions are supported with the quotation and your rationale.
The rationale should back up, or support, your assertion(s). Write your essay for a
well-educated person who is familiar with The Crucible but hasn't read French and Raven's
article.

Read the following scene from trifles. sheriff (chuckling). married to the law. (moves toward the other room.) i just want you to come in here a minute, george. we ought to take a look at these windows. county attorney (scoffingly). oh, windows! sheriff. we’ll be right out, mr. hale. (hale goes outside. the sheriff follows the county attorney into the other room. then mrs. hale rises, hands tight together, looking intensely at mrs. peters, whose eyes take a slow turn, finally meeting mrs. hale’s. a moment mrs. hale holds her, then her own eyes point the way to where the box is concealed. suddenly mrs. peters throws back quilt pieces and tries to put the box in the bag she is wearing. it is too big. she opens box, starts to take the bird out, cannot touch it, goes to pieces, stands there . sound of a knob turning in the other room. mrs. hale snatches the box and puts it in the pocket of her big coat. enter county attorney and sheriff.) county attorney (facetiously). well, henry, at least we found out that she was not going to quilt it. she was going to—what is it you call it, ladies! mrs. hale (her hand against her pocket). we call it—knot it, mr. henderson. what changes might a director or screenwriter make to the original version of this scene in order to best emphasize the mood? cut dialogue from the scene to make it a more appropriate length update the setting to appeal to a more modern-day audience omit the actions of the characters to avoid confusion and chaos include the use of lighting, camera angles, and sound effects

What does the line most likely show about the setting of the scene?

Have you ever thought you understood a person based on a story that you have heard about them? have you ever guessed about a person's personal life because of the clothes they wore? or, have you judged a person because of their friends? although classifying people in this way is typically discouraged, authors deliberately use your preconceived ideas to you form an opinion about the character or to at least have a better understanding. can you think of a time that you made a character call about someone based on external aspects? were you correct, or incorrect? has anyone ever made an incorrect assessment of you based on external aspects? write two paragraphs about it in your journal.