Blacks teaching manners to Whites in literature

The outstanding example is Mammy from Margaret Mitchell's "Gone with the wind". Especially after the death of their mother, she keeps a censorious eye on the three O'Hara girls, especially the oldest, the tempestuous Scarlett. Actually only Mammy knows Scarlett inside out, more than her mother, husbands & even Rhett Butler. She even goes to the extent of fully feeding the girls before they go to any banquet, so that they do eat sparsely there, that being considered ladylike!

The second example is Calpurnia from Harper Lee's "To kill a Mockingbird." Here also she plays a strict surrogate mother to the hoydenish Scout. When Scout mocks a poor hungry boy invited to dinner, Calpurnia hauls Scout out to the kitchen & points out the the boy is "company" (guest) & even if he eats the tablecloth, Scout should not comment! No wonder that Scout's father rejects his sister's advice to get rid of Calpurnia as the children are old enough.

Of course, this way of looking at things may not find favour at the present time, where the Biblical injunction (Matthew 7:5) "First remove the beam out of your eye; and then you can see clearly to remove the speck out of your brother's eye" is observed more in the breach.