Question

How do I go about finding satire in "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"?

Answer 1

Hint: Satire is a literature and performing arts genre, typically fiction and less often non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally to shame people, corporations, government, or improving the world itself.

Complete answer:
An allegory of the American soul, Tom Sawyer is. Hannibal, Missouri, is about halfway up the River Mississippi, which has been around for much of the nation's history. The line between east and west was the dividing line. It's also the dividing line between pre-Civil War north and south, as a slave state across the river from a free state.

Tom's a good boy, not like a wild, unsupervised Huckleberry Finn, but not a jerk like his pious, church-going brother's snitch, Sid. While many of the characters have their directions already set for them, Tom has to figure out his path. He's the perfect "reader identification character."

One characteristic of allegorical stories is that each character reflects a greater section of society than himself. Aunt Polly is a respectable society in the middle class (She owns a slave, though, so her virtue has some blind spots). A killer and a social outcast, Injun Joe is. Muff Potter is a simpleton who's drunk.
Judge Thatcher represents law and order. The kids who paint Tom's fence are the unwashed fool masses.
Decide for yourself: Who looks bad or stupid? What part of American society is reflected by them? Through them, what is Twain trying to say about society? And the satire is yours.

Note: In certain instances, satire and irony have been considered the most potent source of understanding society, the oldest form of social study. They offer the brightest insights into the collective psyche of a group, expose its deepest beliefs and tastes and society's power structures. Satire has been considered superior to non-comic and non-artistic fields such as history or anthropology by some writers.