College Essay About Gender Roles

Life is our stage; we all have a certain role to play, some of us have more roles than others, this doesn’t make them more important, this just means they have more conflicts of strains on the roles they play. Henslin (2015) quoted Shakespeare, “All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many roles… (William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act II, Scene 7)” (pg. 103). Each one of these roles has different conflicts, are anything from choosing work over a social event or a friend over a spouse. I play a big role with several lines and conflicts.

My first role in life is that of being female in my culture I encouraged to get married and have children. That brings me to my second and third role, of being a wife and a mother. My first role is an ascribed status, involuntary. Henslin noted (2015), “Ascribed status in

I schedule my school around my family. I now work 39 hours on weekends so I can still go to class and play my main role of being a wife and a mother. It’s not easy working that many hours in three days, but I do this so I can still give, and take strain off of my husband. This change in my work schedule made a conflict that leads to a strain on our social life.

Another "role" I play is a friend, in our group, the role conflict in my work schedule caused a role strain on my social life and the social life of the people in my group. Henslin noted “A group consists of people who interact with one another and who feel that the values, interests, and norms they have in common are important. The group to which we belong-just like social class, status and roles are powerful forces in our lives.” (pg. 104) Our group decided to resolve that role strain on my family and work around my schedule. This shows that not all people put their role in the same