Both Miller and Ham explore the belonging and diversity in a different way.

In Ham’s novel, the

1950s are generally remembered as the idyllic days of morality and the nuclear family, but

Ham's story depicts what remains when the façade is ripped away and ordinary citizens are

seen for what they are. Even though Ham avoids discussing race, there remains segregation

throughout the neighborhood. Even though Mae McSwiney "did what was expected of her

from the people of Dungatar" (Part 3) and her husband Edward "worked hard...fixed people's

pipes... trimmed their tree and delivered their waste to the tip" (Part 3), the McSwiney family

was and would always be on the periphery of society. It's assumed that their proximity to the

tip, the presence of slow-witted Barney, and their ties to the Dunnage ladies were the reasons

behind this, but as is frequently the case in tiny rural communities, there's no concrete cause

and it's more a case of one group being demoted to make room for another. Similarly, Miller

himself stated that as a Puritan, a religion centered on upholding Christian goodness and unity

of purpose, the community must inevitably reject and ban everything that looks to threaten

that cohesiveness. Sarah Osburn, the "drunk and half-witted" (Act 2) citizen who is blamed

solely because she is different, is an illustration of this in the text.